Situation
An established technical product business sourced a frequently used packaging item at approximately €2.00 per unit. The cost had long been accepted even though volume, specification and sourcing route were poorly aligned.
My role & responsibility
I led the commercial improvement project. My brief was not simply to renegotiate a price, but to create a durable solution and derive further commercial opportunities from it.
My actions
I broke down cost, function and supplier model and reset the service that was genuinely required.
- I separated essential requirements from inherited specifications.
- I broadened and reassessed the supplier base.
- I negotiated from total volume, standardisation and business impact.
- I then developed an adjacent CNC-based product concept.
Results
I reduced unit cost from approximately €2.00 to around €0.30 – an 85 percent reduction. This created material recurring six-figure savings.
This case study is fully anonymised. Company, client, mandate and location names are disclosed only in a confidential conversation.