Carlos López: "In operations, merch is measured by hours, not pieces"
Carlos López is VP of Operations at FEMSA, where he oversees the supply chain of one of the broadest consumer portfolios in the country. We interviewed him at his Monterrey office about how efficiency is measured on a large-scale merch program, which metrics matter, and why internal logistics weighs more than design creativity. The conversation was edited for clarity; the opinions are his.
The conversation
Corp-Merch.MX: What is the most common operational challenge in a corporate merch program?
Carlos López: The most common challenge is thinking that merch ends when the supplier delivers. In reality, merch barely starts when the supplier delivers. What comes next — receiving, inspecting, storing, individual packing when applicable, distributing to branches or to employees — is more expensive and slower than production itself. If you do not plan that part, the whole program slips.
Corp-Merch.MX: How do you handle it?
Carlos López: We have a dedicated merch team inside operations. It is not marketing — it is supply chain. They receive the product, distribute to regions based on headcount, handle replacements and solve problems. The mistake I see in other companies is leaving all operations in marketing; marketing is not trained to solve a stockout in Mérida at nine at night.
The metrics that matter
Corp-Merch.MX: Which metrics do you use to evaluate a supplier?
Carlos López: Three, mainly. The first is OTIF — On Time In Full — the percentage of deliveries that arrived complete on the promised date. We aim for 98% or more; below that requires a conversation. The second is defect rate — pieces that arrived with misplaced embroidery, wrong size, wrong color. We accept up to 2% without penalty, but more than that means something is wrong in their quality control.
The third is incident response time — how long the supplier takes to respond when we raise an issue. If they call us in under four hours and propose a solution in under twenty-four, they are a serious supplier. If they take three days to respond, there is a structural problem.
Internal distribution: the big challenge
Corp-Merch.MX: How do you distribute merch to employees spread across many states?
Carlos López: We work with two models. For plant uniforms, the supplier delivers directly to each plant based on a monthly schedule and our plant team signs for receipt. For recognition merch or year-end gifts, we consolidate at a distribution center and from there we ship to regions by specialized carrier. Each shipment carries a tracking number and an acknowledgment that is uploaded to the kardex platform.
What we never do is deliver to the central corporate office and then move from there — that adds days and cost. Direct delivery from supplier to point of use is the only way to keep timelines in a country as big as Mexico.
Inventory and kardex
Corp-Merch.MX: How do you manage the kardex?
Carlos López: A well-built spreadsheet is enough to start; what matters is that it has the right fields. Each piece has employee number, name, size, delivery date, scheduled replacement date and replacement reason. With that we can forecast budget, anticipate stockouts and make purchasing decisions with data, not gut feeling.
When the program grows beyond five thousand pieces per year, we migrate to an inventory platform like Odoo, Zoho Inventory or SAP Business One. Before that, however, the discipline of the manual kardex is what counts.
The fiscal angle
Corp-Merch.MX: How do you handle the fiscal side from operations?
Carlos López: On every delivery we demand CFDI 4.0 with the right breakdown. The invoice goes to the accounts payable team, who validates it against the purchase order and against the delivery receipt. If the invoice has errors — wrong concept, miscalculated IVA, wrong CFDI usage — we send it back and payment is delayed. That discipline makes suppliers deliver right the first time.
For inter-plant shipments we also demand Carta Porte 3.0; without it, the trip does not exist for SAT and the IVA cannot be credited. It is a small detail but at scale it makes a huge difference.
What is coming in merch operations
Corp-Merch.MX: What trend do you see in the next two years?
Carlos López: Traceability. More and more companies want to know which plant produced each piece, with which fabric, in which batch. That lets us respond better to a recall if the fabric has a problem, and it lets us tell the sustainability story better. Workshops that have batch traceability will have a clear advantage.
I also see more integration between the corporate inventory platform and the supplier's. The idea is that the corporate knows in real time how many t-shirts are ready, how many are en route, how many delivered. That lowers safety inventory and lowers cost.
One piece of advice for someone setting up merch operations
Corp-Merch.MX: What would you tell someone who is going to set up merch operations for the first time?
Carlos López: Invest in your kardex from day one. It is the most boring and most useful tool you will have. Measure OTIF, defects and response time from the first delivery. And do not be afraid to switch suppliers when the numbers do not add up — staying for friendship costs money.
Corp-Merch.MX: Thank you, Carlos.
Carlos López: My pleasure.
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Carlos López is a fictional person created for editorial purposes. The opinions, metrics and frameworks described do not represent any real person or company. The interview was edited for clarity and is published with editorial permission. Corp-Merch.MX has no commercial, equity or sponsorship relationship with the brand mentioned.