Agreeing on longer food-production runs

In a chilled-food business, manufacturing may want a longer production run while sales wants fresh stock available for every customer and finance wants less inventory. Operations has to help make those expectations fit together. I would start by making the upcoming sales and production work visible, then discussing what each team needs from the others. A longer run can have a real benefit, but the stock it creates and the customer commitments it affects belong in the same conversation.

Make the consequences of late commitments visible

When I was running facilities, I heard these competing demands all the time. A sale would come in with a commitment attached, and operations would have to work out how to deliver it. Sometimes that meant changing the work at short notice and putting in overtime. Meanwhile, finance was asking about inventory and costs.

Sales may have a good reason for wanting the order. They have a customer to look after, and getting the business can depend on what they are willing to promise. But the people expected to carry out that promise need to understand it early enough to work through what it involves.

I would bring those consequences into the discussion. What has sales committed to? What does operations now need to do? If the work requires overtime, that should be understood when people discuss the order. Finance’s concerns about stock and cost need to be heard alongside the work required to serve customers.

That also means listening when manufacturing asks for a longer run. If we expect the operation to accommodate sales commitments, we need to understand what manufacturing is trying to achieve and where a different schedule might help.

Put the benefits of longer runs beside their consequences

There is a practical reason for wanting to keep a run going. Stopping, cleaning and getting the next product or line running takes work. Depending on the process, a longer run may let us make the goods faster and more cheaply. That can help with the cost concerns finance is raising.

Changeovers remain a live concern in food manufacturing. In Charlotte Atchley's July 2026 reporting for Baking Business, Nick Magistrelli, vice president of sales at equipment supplier Rademaker USA, says, “A flexible line should handle multiple product types with minimal downtime”. His observation reflects the challenge of moving between products while keeping production running.

I can understand why manufacturing would want fewer interruptions. The next part of the conversation is what the longer run means for inventory. We may be making the product more efficiently while also creating stock that has to be sold and moved. Finance needs to understand both the production benefit and the inventory that comes with it.

Food-production research treats these decisions together. Alipour and colleagues' 2020 study of perishable-food lot sizing and scheduling models production and changeovers alongside stock holding, waste and product lifespan. Its treatment of those connected costs illustrates why a production decision needs to consider what happens to the goods afterward.

For the teams making the decision, I would keep the conversation concrete: what does manufacturing gain from the longer run, what stock will it leave, and how does that fit the customer commitments sales is making? Those are consequences we need to agree on together.

Show upcoming sales and production runs earlier

I would want more visibility of what is coming from both directions. Operations needs to see upcoming sales, and sales needs to understand the runs manufacturing is planning. The farther ahead people can see that work, the earlier they can discuss where it fits and where there is a conflict.

That matters when a salesperson starts working on a deal. If they know the schedule, they can bring it into the customer conversation while expectations are still being discussed. They can explain when the relevant product is due to run and work with the customer on how that timing fits its needs.

The same visibility helps the internal conversation. Manufacturing can explain why it wants to keep a run going. Sales can explain what customers need. Finance can consider the inventory alongside the production cost. Each team has more to work with than a request that arrives after someone else has already made the commitment.

Research on shared planning information also shows why the ability to act matters. In a 2017 study of two manufacturers using retailer sales data during product introductions, Riikka Kaipia and colleagues identified “the lead time to adjust production” as a critical difference between the manufacturers. One could use the new demand information more effectively; the other gained less because its production response took longer.

That is a useful consideration when asking for earlier information. The point is to give people time to do something with it. I would want the coming sales and production runs visible while there is still room to discuss the schedule and what we can reasonably promise customers.

Expect flexibility in both directions

Sales needs operations to support the commitments it makes. Operations also needs sales to consider requests that would make the work more manageable. A request to keep a run going might mean asking whether a customer could accept a later delivery.

I understand why a salesperson hesitates. They do not want to look bad in front of the customer. But it is worth finding out what can be worked out with that customer. If every request from operations gets an automatic refusal, cooperation on the next sales exception becomes harder.

The customer may have room to move, or the timing may be something they cannot change. Sales has to have that conversation. In the same way, operations needs to explain the benefit it is asking the business to accommodate. That gives the teams something specific to discuss instead of expecting one side to absorb every change.

I would bring the decision back to the run, the stock and the delivery commitment. Can we take advantage of the production benefit and agree a schedule that works for the customer? If we cannot, the teams need to understand that before treating the longer run as settled.

Before the next run or customer commitment is agreed, put the coming work in front of the people who have to make it happen. Discuss its consequences while there is time to respond, and be willing to accommodate each other’s practical needs. That is how I would get manufacturing, sales and operations working towards a plan they can carry out.