Whole Brain Consulting Brings On Food Industry Supply Chain Expert, Charles O’Brien

Food industry supply chain expert Charles (Chuck) O’Brien’s career is focused on operations, contract manufacturing, and procurement, leveraging the latest tools to drive world class performance into end-to-end supply chains.

Chuck brings 15 years of end-to-end supply chain experience, driving sourcing, managing ongoing performance/optimization, implementing innovation, leveraging the latest procurement tools to drive negotiations and develop performance-based contracts to deliver short- and long-term solutions while mitigating risk. This includes direct financial, budget and continuous improvement responsibility. He also brings extensive experience managing internal and external stakeholders. He has decades of large CPG experience where part of his work included driving global platforms strategy development and aligning it to internal manufacturing strategy.

As a result, Chuck knows how to work globally in markets across various cultures. During his tenure, he has been leveraged to evaluate the supply chain of target mergers and acquisitions and organization development of the global contract manufacturing organization. He has direct experience in a wide variety of platforms: cereal, cookies, crackers, bars, snacks (various types), frozen entrees, waffles/pancakes, ESL/aseptic dairy, meat analogs, hot fill and aseptic beverages, bagels, retort, assembly (sandwiches), etc.

We asked Chuck to tell us a little about himself so our clients know what services and expertise are available through Whole Brain Consulting.

Q: What is your role at WBC?

A: My role is best described as a food industry supply chain expert, both strategically and on how to get things done. I make this distinction because my experience has given me broad exposure across all aspects of supply chain on numerous manufacturing platforms with in-depth experience in plant operations, innovation implementation/execution, contract manufacturing searching/sourcing, contract development/management, and relationship management.

Q: Over the past 15 years, what have you learned about the industry that Whole Brain Consulting clients may find surprising and useful?

A: Do not underestimate the value of a good contract manufacturing contract.

Q: What was your favorite project thus far?

A: I think about it in terms of people more than projects.  When the right combination of a good idea and story comes together with an entrepreneur that not only has the passion and drive but also the wisdom to leverage expertise in the industry to make it come to life—that’s when the magic can happen. Misdirected drive and lack of wisdom derail more good ideas than I care to think about.  I really enjoy my clients who recognize this and, as a result, embrace industry expertise in a very constructive way.

Q: What do you wish clients knew (that they usually don’t)?

A: Challenging experts in healthy debate is good and necessary. However, when you are being told you have a tail more than once and even by more than one person, you may want to look in the mirror.

Q: What sets Whole Brain Consulting apart from the competition?

A: We know where our expertise lies and we bring that to bear.  We also know when and where to reach out to other resources in the industry when needed.  This maximizes the value stream for our clients, leading to the best outcome possible. In our areas of expertise, we don’t just provide a resource, we provide a seasoned resource backed by a team of equally qualified resources to lean on and leverage wherever and whenever needed.

Chuck started his career over 10 years ago where he held various roles across four manufacturing plants working in quality, and operations line supervision gaining an extensive background and knowledge of not only managing operations but also process and packaging technologies. Supplementing his strengths in supply chain is nine years of direct innovation experience, scaling and implementing projects at both internal plants and contract manufacturers. He not only has a strong working knowledge of the innovation process, but also a strong understanding of food formulation and processing requirements necessary to produce quality cost effective products.