Optimizing the procurement of a recycled raw material at Brussels Beer Project

Details

Supervisors

Semal, Pierre

Faculty

Louvain School of Management

Degree label

Master [120] en Ingénieur de gestion

Abstract

Brussels Beer Project is a small brewing company based in Brussels and was founded in 2013. The idea is to propose a new perspective for Belgian beer. Using tools like co-creation and crowdsourcing, they managed to create more than 30 recipes within the last 2 years. Among their beers, one is brewed with fresh and unsold bread from supermarkets. The starting point of the idea is the absurd fact that there are tons of bread wasted every day. The purpose is then to transform this unsold bread in a raw material for a specific beer called Babylone. Even though BBP already implemented a supply process to gather the bread and transform it into a raw material, this one had not been supervised since the beginning of the project. Recently, they pointed out some irregularities in the delivery of this finished but wasted product. During an internship, we have been asked to look for the potential causes and solutions of this sourcing issues and to implement the best one. However, the procurement of raw materials may not be similar in a SME as in a big company. Furthermore, an interesting question would be to know what the use of a finished product as a raw material implies in terms of sourcing strategy and procurement in general. How can the procurement of a SME’s raw material be optimized? Especially in a case of circular economy, when the raw material is the finished and wasted product of another company?