Introduction

Founded in 1981, VITA is Norway’s largest beauty and wellness retailer. They have 116 stores around the country, including an online shop. Their vision is to be a leading and trusted companion on your beauty journey — whatever direction it takes.

To fulfill this vision, VITA offers an extensive selection of brands and products for customers to realize their beauty journey. That means they have a huge network of suppliers — around 14,000 product lines and over 1,000 suppliers.

With a complex supply chain, VITA needed to better manage and stay in control of their suppliers. They partnered with Ignite to:

• Have a complete overview of their most strategic suppliers
• Set up a systematic approach to work with risk
• Maintain an ethical supply chain and comply with Norway’s Transparency Act (Åpenhetsloven)
  

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Staying in control of supplier relationships

VITA is committed to ethical and responsible sourcing.

They had already been setting up processes to ensure they were operating ethically, which included becoming a member of “Ethical Trade Norway.” They implemented strict guidelines for their suppliers to follow and inspected their factories often. VITA also bought most of their products from Norwegian and other European suppliers.

To progress further, they wanted a more structured approach, which would enable them to:

• Anchor social and ethical guidelines at the top of their organization
• Establish procedures to organize and follow up with their suppliers
• Have systematic risk evaluations of their suppliers
• Implement a plan for handling breaches of ethics

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VITA’s challenges

To get a systematic approach in place, VITA had a few pressing challenges to deal with.

They wanted to have better control of their suppliers, especially the ones that fell outside their own production. They struggled to map their supply chain, which made it hard to prioritize their suppliers.

VITA also faced a significant transition — a complete overhaul of their ERP system in the first quarter of 2023.

These challenges, coupled with the impending Transparency Act, meant they needed to move quickly and started looking for a partner to fill the gaps.

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Building a future-proof and ethical supply chain

VITA turned to Ignite, looking for comprehensive software to navigate their challenges with supplier management and compliance needs.

VITA was impressed by Ignite’s flexible options for uploading supplier data, which lowered the barrier for them to get started quickly. This enabled them to finally gather their suppliers in one place.  

Their supplier data was automatically enriched with information about the suppliers’ potential risk based on industry and location. This was done using indexes from the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), Freedom House, and Transparency International.

They were able to combine this risk information with their spend data on Ignite. Doing this provided VITA with transparency on which suppliers they spend the most on. It helped them identify and prioritize 268 suppliers who needed further risk analysis.  

Having this data alongside their supplier overview made it possible for VITA to achieve their goal. They were able to set up a systematic approach to working with their suppliers.

VITA also found that Ignite’s templates, questionnaires, and support were key to complying with the Transparency Act in 2023.
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Feeling confident that they have their suppliers and compliance under control, VITA plans to continue working with Ignite to ensure compliance in 2024.

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The impact

• 268 suppliers identified for further risk evaluation  
• 23 questionnaires sent
• 7 suppliers with high risk
• Complied with the Transparency Act