---
title: "M&S case study: Not just any supplier platform"
description: "M&S Food Technical Centre needed a new system to replace their older one and manage their work with suppliers and auditors. M&S Connect brought documents, audits, benchmarking and reporting into one platform, and M&S extended it for nearly ten years."
url: https://www.pivale.co/work/marks-and-spencer/
publisher: Pivale (https://www.pivale.co)
---

# M&S case study: Not just any supplier platform

M&S Food Technical Centre needed a new system to replace their older one and manage their work with suppliers and auditors. M&S Connect brought documents, audits, benchmarking and reporting into one platform, and M&S extended it for nearly ten years.

The problem: M&S Food Technical Centre had to replace the older system behind their work with suppliers and auditors. The solution: M&S Connect: documents, audits, benchmarking and reporting in one web platform. The outcome: Thousands of users across M&S teams, auditors and suppliers, and extended for nearly ten years.

| | |
|---|---|
| Client | M&S Food Technical Centre |
| Sector | Food retail |
| Services | Discovery workshops, content strategy, design prototypes, data migration, Drupal web application build, hosting, support |
| Engagement | August 2014 to launch in July 2015, then extended and supported until March 2025 |

## Outcomes

- **6** applications in one platform, from documents to benchmarking
- **3** user groups adopted it: M&S teams, auditors and suppliers

## The challenge: A critical system to replace.

M&S Food Technical Centre needed new software to replace their older system and support their work with suppliers and auditors.

M&S had worked with Pivale before and asked for a new, critical piece of software. It had to hold a document library personalised to each supplier's requirements, a database of organisations, users, roles and permissions, and form workflows with task follow-up.

M&S also needed audit controls generated for each supplier, nutritional benchmarking against competitors' products, and dashboards with on-screen reports and Excel exports. The old system's raw data also had to move into the new one.

## What we built: A clear interface over complex workflows.

### Supplier document library

Each supplier sees a document library personalised to their own requirements.

### Roles and permissions

M&S manages organisations, users and roles in one database, and emails go straight to suppliers when content changes.

### Reports and benchmarking

M&S benchmarks the nutrition of their products against competitors', with dashboards, on-screen reports and Excel exports.

### A design system and icon set

A bespoke icon set marks each area, and shared patterns for forms and controls keep new features consistent on desktop, tablet and mobile.

## What the client said

> Connect has been a great success. It is software that is intuitive with clear codes of practice... and it affords us better management of our contact lists with clarity on when updates take place as emails go directly to suppliers.

— Claire Hughes, Head of Central Technology, M&S

## Results: Built to keep growing.

### Adopted across the supply chain

Internal and external auditors, food technologists and supply partners have all adopted Connect.

### Clear contact management

M&S knows when updates happen, because emails go straight to suppliers.

### Data carried across

Pivale wrote algorithms to move the old system's raw data into Connect's new structures.

### Room to extend

M&S added new functionality as their operations changed, with no visual disruption or extra design work, until March 2025.

## Related solutions and services

- [Portals & intranets](https://www.pivale.co/solutions/portals-intranets): Custom systems that support daily operations.
- [Audits & discovery](https://www.pivale.co/services/audits): Customer experience and website systems audits.
- [UX/UI design](https://www.pivale.co/services/ux-ui): Interfaces people actually enjoy using.
- [Drupal development](https://www.pivale.co/services/drupal): Content management for ambitious enterprises.
- [Web app development](https://www.pivale.co/services/web-apps): When off-the-shelf doesn’t cut it.
- [Secure hosting](https://www.pivale.co/services/hosting): Upsun’s certified cloud, behind Cloudflare.
- [Support & security](https://www.pivale.co/services/support): Responsive support that grows with you.

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Source: https://www.pivale.co/work/marks-and-spencer/. Pivale is a UK digital consultancy. Book a 30-minute call at https://www.pivale.co/contact/ or email hello@pivale.co.