Oliver Wight Serves Up Class A Performance Milestone for Heinz

Heinz has received the Oliver Wight Class A Milestone Award for
its Integrated Business Management programme; the programme has
delivered performance metrics of up to 99 percent across the entire
northern and eastern European operation.

What began as a localised programme to improve the predictability
of its European operation, quickly became Heinz's global strategy for
business improvement - the Heinz Business Management (HBM) programme -
and with the help of specialist consultants Oliver Wight, Heinz has
achieved world class performance for its northern and eastern European
operation inside 15 months.

'Class A' is Oliver Wight's industry-recognised standard for
business excellence, only awarded to those companies able to sustain
performance metrics of at least 95 percent. The northern and eastern
European is the first Heinz region to receive a Class A Milestone
Award (for 'Capable Integrated Business Management') but HBM business
leader, Gerard de Bruijn, says the benefits are widespread throughout
the organisation: "Even though the Oliver Wight programme began as a
local project, it has now become the established way of working for
the entire company."

The Oliver Wight programme extends the principles of Sales and
Operations Planning (S&OP) throughout the Heinz organisation - new
product development, financial, forecasting and strategic alignment.
Heinz now has a 24-month horizon for its new product development (NPD)
strategy with between 20 and 30 high-end NPDs in progress every year.
Meanwhile, its business review process ensures that individual
objectives and activities are linked right through to the corporate
strategic plan. Customer service performance now averages 99 percent
with supply and financial accuracy showing just two percent volatility
and demand accuracy just five percent.

As other Heinz regions achieve Class A Milestone Awards for their
integrated business management programmes, de Bruijn is leading his
region to Class A performance for advanced strategic planning, which
he expects to achieve early in the New Year.

Notes to editors

About Oliver Wight

Oliver Wight are leading business improvement specialists who
educate, coach and mentor people to lead and sustain change on the
journey to business excellence and outstanding business performance.
The largest world-wide consultancy of our type, we have offices
throughout Europe, in North and South America and the Asia/Pacific
Region.

Oliver Wight have a history of working with 'blue chip'
organisations and medium-sized businesses going back over three
decades. Through a process of knowledge transfer, facilitated
workshops and ongoing coaching and support, we help organisations
adopt the correct sequence of business improvement techniques;
recognise the linkages and transitions required on the journey to
business excellence; and undertake the necessary repositioning of
performance measures and organisational structure.