How One of North America's Largest Grocers Took Control of Supplier Collaboration and Improved Margins

When Margin Pressure Meets Operational Inefficiency 

Safeway operates in one of retail's most unforgiving arenas. As one of North America's largest supermarket chains, it faces relentless pressure from both general merchandise retailers and dollar stores — all competing for the same cost-conscious consumer. To stay ahead, Safeway had made expanding its direct sourcing and private label programs a strategic priority. But the internal processes needed to support that ambition weren't keeping pace. 

Order planning and execution relied heavily on manual procedures that were generating high error rates and slowing execution. Tendering was inefficient, supplier onboarding lacked structure, and collaboration with the broader supplier base was difficult to manage consistently at scale. On top of that, meeting compliance obligations like ISF 10+2 required a level of oversight the existing systems simply couldn't provide. Safeway recognized that competing on margin while running on manual processes was no longer sustainable — and set out to find a platform that could fix it. 

From Tendering to Compliance, Handled in One Place 

After a competitive evaluation of global solutions, Safeway selected TradeBeyond — choosing it for its deep experience supporting leading supermarket and general merchandise chains including Migros, ICA, Home Retail Group, and Kmart. What set TradeBeyond apart was its latest-generation SaaS platform, purpose-built for the complexity of large-scale retail sourcing, with collaboration tools, advanced dashboards, and management-by-exception capabilities that Safeway's teams could act on immediately. 

The implementation brought Safeway's end-to-end sourcing, order, logistics, and finance processes onto a single, cloud-based platform — eliminating the disconnected systems and manual steps that had been slowing the business down. TradeBeyond automated the tendering process and streamlined order planning and execution, while the Supplier Collaboration tool gave Safeway a structured way to manage onboarding, quality assurance, inspections, and regulatory compliance — all in one place. For the first time, both Safeway and its suppliers had full visibility into their shared information, freeing both sides to focus on building the business rather than chasing it. 

More Automation. Less Overhead. A Sourcing Program Built to Grow 

The results have touched every part of Safeway's sourcing operation. Manual data entry has been significantly reduced, giving the workforce back time that had previously been lost to low-value administrative tasks. Tendering, supplier onboarding, and quality assurance — once among the most labour-intensive processes in the business — are now largely automated, delivering greater consistency and freeing teams to focus on decisions that drive value. 

Supplier management, quality control, and compliance are all easier to oversee and improve through the TradeBeyond platform, with no additional investment in hardware, infrastructure, or headcount required. The efficiency gains have been felt across the entire supply chain flow, from sourcing and logistics through to finance. Most importantly, the operational improvements have created the conditions Safeway needed to accelerate its strategic goals — rapidly expanding its direct sourcing program and private label assortment, and putting the retailer firmly on track to improve margins in one of retail's most competitive categories. As TradeBeyond CEO Michael Hung describes it: "Both sides benefit through having full visibility into all their information exchange, freeing up their time to focus on building their business." 

About Safeway 

Safeway is one of the largest American supermarket and general merchandise chain retailers, which became a subsidiary of Albertsons in 2015. With the supermarket space facing fierce competition from both general merchandise and dollar stores, Safeway put greater focus on streamlining their operations and improving margins through expanding their assortment of private label offerings.