# Supplier Discovery

## What It Is

The Supplier Discovery skill gives your assignments specialized knowledge for finding and evaluating emerging grocery and CPG (consumer packaged goods) brands. It is designed for Category Managers who need to identify new supplier candidates by analyzing social media trends, consumer buzz, and market signals—surfacing fast-moving brands that traditional trade channels miss.

This is a default skill—ready to use immediately without any setup.

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## What It Can Do

### Trend Scanning

* Scan industry publications, trend aggregator sites, and consumer communities to identify what categories and product themes are gaining traction
* Pull signals from sources including trade press (FoodDive, BevNET, FoodNavigator), trend platforms (Exploding Topics, TrendHunter), and community forums
* Classify trends by timeframe: emerging (6–12 months), growing (1–2 years), or established

### Brand Identification

* Find specific brands and companies operating in a trend category
* Filter results for actual CPG product companies available for wholesale or retail distribution
* Target 10–20 candidate brands per trend from curated roundup articles and trade publication watchlists

### Profile Enrichment

* Build a profile for each candidate brand covering social presence, product range, distribution status, and market positioning
* Gather social metrics (follower counts, engagement rates) from public brand profiles on TikTok and Instagram
* Collect company data including funding signals, team background, certifications, and unique selling propositions

### Scoring and Ranking

* Score each candidate across three dimensions: Social Momentum (40%), Product-Market Fit (35%), and Novelty and Differentiation (25%)
* Assign tier ratings: Hot (75+), Watch (50–74), or Early (25–49)
* Produce ranked output using relative scoring that accounts for category context

### Report Assembly

* Generate a full supplier discovery report with executive summary, trend overview, and individual profiles with score breakdowns
* Produce a data table (Google Sheets or CSV) with one row per candidate and all metrics
* Post a condensed top-5 summary to Slack with links to the full report

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## When to Use It

Use the Supplier Discovery skill when your assignment needs to:

* **Refresh assortment options**: Find new brands to consider stocking during a periodic category review
* **Expand into a new subcategory**: Scout suppliers when entering a category where you have limited existing relationships
* **Act on trend signals**: Respond to a specific trend (e.g., "find trending brands in plant-based snacks")
* **Monitor competitors**: Identify buzzy new brands a competitor has started stocking
* **Run innovation scouting**: Look for novel product formats or ingredient stories ahead of a buyer meeting

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## Example Tasks

* "Find the top emerging brands in functional beverages for our next category review"
* "Which DTC snack brands are gaining traction on TikTok that we should consider listing?"
* "Scout 15 plant-based dairy alternatives and rank them for our assortment refresh"
* "Give me a Slack summary of the top 5 new coffee brands with the strongest social momentum"

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## How to Use

1. Open the assignment you want to configure
2. In the assignment settings, find the Skills section
3. Select the Supplier Discovery skill
4. In your assignment's SOP, describe the categories, subcategories, or trend themes you want to scout
5. Optionally connect Google Sheets for structured data output or Slack for summary alerts

Your assignment uses the skill's research and scoring methodology automatically when running your supplier scouting workflow.

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## Things to Know

* This is a default skill available to all teams
* Social metrics are sourced from public brand pages only—private or login-gated content is not accessed
* Scoring is relative within each report run, not against a fixed global benchmark
* The skill uses Human-in-the-Loop validation before sending any report externally or reaching out to identified brands
* Pairs with the Input Cost Monitor skill when a discovered supplier needs cost analysis, and with scheduling to run periodic assortment reviews automatically