The past few decades for FMCG have been a constant evolution of “power shifts” — from product-driven, distribution-driven, to brand-driven, then to traffic-driven.

Today, we’ve entered the era of operational excellence.

This means competition is no longer about winning on a single front. It’s about mastering the end-to-end operational chain — and more often than not, companies stumble on the last mile: the Route-to-Market (RTM).

RTM Is the Strategic Backbone, Not a Supporting Function

In the FMCG world, success no longer depends solely on creating great products or building strong brands. What truly matters is your ability to efficiently reach and engage consumers with those products.

• We’ve all seen these stories:

  • A brand launches a hit product, only to see it languish on shelves due to distributor overstocking.
  • A viral marketing campaign drives massive traffic, but out-of-stocks at the point of sale kill conversion.

  These are not supply chain or marketing problems — they are RTM failures.

   

  RTM is not a side project or an operational footnote — it’s the central artery connecting your product, your distributors, your retailers and your consumers. Companies that will survive the next decade will be those that build integrated operational systems with RTM at the core.

Why RTM Strategies Fail: The Dual Mismatch of Consulting and Enterprise

Consultancy Blind Spots

🧩Framework-driven, not business-driven

Most consulting firms rely heavily on pre-defined frameworks. These models might work for large, stable multinationals — but they rarely fit the fast-evolving, highly localized realities of today’s FMCG markets.

A strategy built on a “direct-to-retail” model for a company still 80% reliant on mom-and-pop distributors will inevitably fail in execution.

🎯 Leadership Bias:

Many consulting outputs are shaped more by leadership preference than market logic. When leadership equates “RTM” with “distributor control” or “inventory tracking,” strategies end up ignoring the most important goal — consumer sell-out.

The result? Channel conflicts, distributor resistance, and system paralysis.

Internal Misalignment

📉 Misreading Retail Evolution

Many FMCG leaders still see new retail trends — instant commerce, live-stream shopping, private community traffic — as just “new places to sell.” They fail to see these as fundamental shifts in consumer behavior and expectation.

One dairy brand, for instance, jumped into community group buying without a channel-specific strategy. The result? Price conflicts and alienated offline distributors.

🔧 Misunderstanding RTM’s Role

Too many companies treat RTM as a tool — a switch to flip from indirect to direct sales, or a dashboard to monitor distributors. But RTM is a core business strategy, not a project.

And when execution is treated as a one-off initiative — without the right team capabilities, system readiness, or partner alignment — it fails.

🧱 Execution Gaps

Even with leadership buy-in, RTM transformations often stall at the frontline. Sales teams used to earning through “order volume” resist shifting to “sell-out support.” Complicating matters are long-standing relationships and entrenched interests between internal staff and distributors.

Success requires both the courage to redesign incentives and the discipline to align the organization.

The Way Forward: RTM as Core of Competitive Operations

There’s no universal RTM template. Your route to market must be designed around your business, your consumers, and your capabilities.

A winning RTM strategy is built on five foundational pillars:

1. Market Trend Insight – Understand where retail is heading, not just where it is.
2. Business Self-Awareness – knowing your real operational bottlenecks, not just surface-level KPIs.
3. RTM Principles & Levers – Know what drives performance in your categories and channels. from route design to territory coverage, assortment planning, and outlet segmentation.
4. Integrated Strategy Design – Align product, supply chain, sales, and marketing.
5. Executional excellence – Build systems, talent, and partnerships that bring the plan to life.

RTM success is ultimately about mindset and execution — not just strategy slides.

Turning “Drawer Strategies” into Operational Reality

At eBest, we’ve seen FMCG leaders who turned RTM into their strongest competitive advantage.

By leveraging mobile-first field execution, real-time sales visibility, and AI-powered decision support, brands can connect every player in their route-to-market — from brand to distributor, retailer, and field rep — into one agile ecosystem.