International MBA Program
Internship Web Journal
Christina Corrigan
IMBA Class of 2008
Sonoco, Araras, Brazil
christina_corrigan@moore.sc.edu
Journal Entry #4 - August 7, 2007:
Well, it’s hard
to believe that this is my last week here in Brazil! Time has flown by!
My projects here at Sonoco are wrapping up nicely. The packaging materials bidding closed and savings were achieved. As I mentioned in my last entry, the stretch film bidding had concluded and the new supplier was implemented. This month we were already able to track savings with the new strategic supplier. Now that the corrugated cardboard box bidding is finished, the new strategic supplier is in the process of being implemented.
The administrative productivity project has also come along nicely. We were able to break down spend amounts for the various entities in Brazil by airfare, hotels, and rental cars. We are now conducting an information seeking/negotiation process with various travel agencies in Brazil in order to pick one for Sonoco to use in Brazil in order to gain leverage to negotiate savings for future travel.
The project
that has consumed the majority of my time here is Freight Movement. After spending some time
familiarizing myself with the freight movement process here in Brazil, at the three largest Sonoco
facilities in particular, I worked with some templates sent from Sonoco Corporate Headquarters in
order to create an RFI (Request for Information) template in Portuguese to send out to various
suppliers here in Brazil. I evaluated the responses with my Brazilian advisor, and chose a handful
of companies to send the RFP (Request for Proposal). I was able to come into contact with some
companies that Sonoco had not contacted in the past, and the results have been positive.
Unfortunately, I will not be here as the bidding is finalized and possible new suppliers are
implemented, as I am getting ready to head back to school and start my second year of IMBA classes.
However, I hope to stay informed! Overall, this time working with Sonoco this summer has been a
wonderful learning experience!
During my spare time over the past month I
have continued to spend my weekends in Sao Paulo catching up with old friends. I stopped by my old
elementary school, and have also been to a few weddings with some old family friends. I was also
able to make it back to Curitiba one weekend in order to visit my friends from the language
training portion of my program.
It was great to be back in Curitiba, as it is really
a great city in Brazil!
I was
also able to take a day trip to a small town near Araras called Santa Barbara d’Oeste, which has a
very interesting history! After the Civil War, the Portuguese Emperor recruited Americans from the
South to come to Brazil and teach the Brazilians how to grow cotton. Therefore, at the time, many
southerners moved to Brazil and settled in this region of Santa Barbara and the town next door
called Americana. There is an old “confederate” cemetery in Santa Barbara where they host a
festival every year with typical food and dancing from the southern United States, and they even
have Civil War reenactments….. Who would have thought that would go on here in Brazil!
This week I am
finalizing my presentations and my work here at Sonoco do Brasil, and then I will start my journey
back to South Carolina! I will have a little over a week before I start classes, and I am headed to
Peru in order to hike the Inca Trail to Macchu Pichu with some friends of mine from college! I am
really looking forward to the hike, and then look forward to heading back to Columbia. Overall I
have been very happy with my 8 months abroad, but I am also very ready to be home, and look forward
to being back on US soil.
Journal Entry #3 - July 3, 2007:
My time in here in Brazil is really flying by! I cannot believe it is already July, and I have been working with Sonoco do Brasil, based in Araras, for about a month. I have been traveling between the two factories in Araras (Sonoco do Brasil, and a joint-venture, SonocoForPlas), the paper mill in Londrina, and the office in Sao Paulo. I have gotten to know the people at the various locations and begun my new set of projects.
Throughout my
first week, everyone was very welcoming, and one of my co-workers hosted a "churrasco" at her
farm near the factory, so I could get to know some of my co-workers! A "churrasco" is a
great Brazilian tradition of just grilling a variety of meats and relaxing with friends while
eating the meats as they are ready, hot off the grill!
I am working on
four projects for Sonoco. One is bidding freight movement in order to diversify suppliers and
decrease costs. Another is bidding packaging companies that Sonoco works with (stretch film
and corrugated cardboard boxes). My third project has to do with analyzing the imports of
Durox paper (from the United States) and parchment paper (from France) in order to reduce working
capital. The fourth project that I am working on is an analysis of administrative expenses,
including airfare, hotels, rental cars, etc, in order to cut costs.
The eight different factory locations in Brazil work with many different suppliers for all of the services listed above, and a big part of my task is to work on consolidating the different entities so Sonoco, as a company, provides increased business for the various suppliers.
This will give Sonoco more power in the negotiation process, and consequently enable them to cut costs. I am currently focusing on the three largest factories, (the two in Araras, and the paper mill in Londrina), with the hope of later expanding efforts to include all locations. I am working closely with Sonoco’s corporate headquarters in Hartsville, SC in order to translate documents and develop standard templates to use here in Brazil.
I have had the opportunity to participate in various price negotiation meetings, and have gathered lots of data for my projects. The price bidding for stretch film has ended successfully, and the new strategic supplier is currently being implemented. The other bidding processes should be wrapped up within the next few weeks. Once results come back, it will be interesting to see by how much Sonoco will be able to reduce costs as a result of these efforts. These projects are very team oriented, so I am enjoying working with my various co-workers on the tasks at hand. I will keep you posted on the results in my next entry!
As far as free time goes, I am pretty busy
during the week, but on the weekends I have spent time with old family friends from my childhood
both in the city of Sao Paulo, and on the Sao Paulo shore (which is beautiful)! Although it
is "winter" here, it has thankfully not been very cold When the sun is shining, it is very
pleasant beach weather!!
Journal Entry #2 - June 11, 2007:
I have now been back in Brazil for about
two weeks, following my two weeks of internship training at Sonoco’s corporate headquarters in
Hartsville, South Carolina.
In Hartsville, I was introduced to everyone in the Logistics/Supply Chain Department, and had the opportunity to meet and speak with people about the freight movement process in the United States, so I could later compare it to the freight movement process in Brazil. I also had a chance to meet with coordinators of both the Resende and Araras plants in order to familiarize myself with their processes and my projects in Brazil. During free time between meetings, I completed an informative online e-learning course on Lean Systems. I learned a lot in just two weeks, and felt ready and excited to return to Brazil to get started!
On Monday
morning, May 14
th, I arrived in Resende, got settled in my hotel, and went to the Sonoco factory to get
started. This particular factory specializes in producing easy open metal ends for canned
foods (such as tuna-fish, fruits, vegetables), eliminating the need for a can opener. The
factory was strategically constructed in Brazil near the steel conglomerate CSN due to the cheap
price of Brazilian steel. Following introductions and a factory tour, I started researching
my project.
My task was to find a way to streamline the import process for a variety of materials needed in the production of the metal ends. In order to streamline the process, I had to find a way to reduce transit time and cost. After analyzing and breaking down the process, I was able to locate the bottlenecks both in the United States and Brazil, and make some recommendations in order to reduce transit time. I was also able to identify the breakeven point for a number of items shipped in order to emphasize the importance of shipping FCL (full container load) over LCL (less than container load). Consolidating orders so that shipments of materials are made in full container loads as opposed to partial container loads, should reduce both cost and transit time. The techniques developed will now be put to use and hopefully help the import process of these products run more smoothly. A similar analysis may also be applied to other imported products in order to streamline their processes as well. Working on this project was a great opportunity, and I feel as though my ideas were received well and will hopefully result in a positive impact on plant operations.
During my free time in Resende, I had the
opportunity to visit a very quaint Finnish town nearby called Penedo, known for its unique
architecture, delicious chocolate shops, winter festivals, and natural hot springs. Resende
is located near the oldest national park in Brazil; therefore there is also some great hiking
nearby! As Resende is only about an hour and a half from Rio de Janeiro, I was able to spend
the weekend in Rio. With IMBA classmate Scott Laronge, who is completing his internship with
Amsterdam Sauer in Rio, I was able to visit the famous Christ statue and Sugarloaf Mountain.
I was also, of course, able to spend some time on the beach in Ipanema, and buy souvenirs at
Ipanema’s famous Sunday street fair!
After a beautiful drive through the Brazilian countryside, I have just arrived at my hotel in Araras, and will be starting my next set of projects tomorrow. These projects will deal with logistics, and I look forward to meeting the team there and getting started with the bidding process for suppliers/freight movement. I am also looking forward to moving into a house tomorrow! I will be renting a room in a co-worker’s home, and look forward to being settled here in Araras for the next few months.
Journal Entry #1 - May 7, 2007:
I've never kept an online journal before, but it seems appropriate to start out with an introduction and some background information about myself. I received my BA in Economics from Villanova University, and then worked as a property manager in Washington, DC for about two years. I grew up overseas (in Brazil, the Philippines, and Mexico), and after working in DC for about a year I realized that I wanted to do something more international, so I looked into various MBA programs. I decided to attend the IMBA program at USC because I liked the opportunity it presented to have an 8 month immersion abroad studying a language and completing an internship. Since I lived in Brazil as a child, but had forgotten my Portuguese, I chose the Portuguese Track so that I could get my language back.
Followed by an exciting and busy six months
of introductory MBA classes, I packed up my bags and moved to Curitiba, Brazil in early January
2007. I lived with a Brazilian girl about my age, and really had a wonderful experience in
Curitiba, as I had the opportunity to get to know her friends and family, and of course practice
Portuguese!
The Portuguese Track was made up of seven
IMBA students, and we all had a great experience in Curitiba! We started out with three
months of language training followed by a very informative three week business course entitled, “
Doing Business in Brazil,” where we had the opportunity to tour businesses in Curitiba, attend
lectures, and sit in on Brazilian MBA classes.
We also appeared on the morning news a few times as the Brazilians were very excited to have this group of foreign MBA students interested in their economy and culture!
The Brazilian culture is very friendly and
welcoming, and you can’t beat the beautiful beaches (which are very close to Curitiba), and the
all-you-can-eat "churrascarias" steakhouses) where you spend less than 10 bucks for a gourmet meal
and caipirinha!
I have now returned to South Carolina for two weeks of internship training with Sonoco’s
Logistics/Supply Chain Management Division, and will move back to Brazil on May 13
th. I will spend two weeks in Resende, outside of Rio de Janeiro helping Sonoco
streamline their inventory process, and then I will move to Araras in Sao Paulo state to complete
my internship with a Logistics Project. I just started a few days ago, so we are still going
over the details of my projects, but I am very excited about this wonderful opportunity!
Everyone at Sonoco has been very welcoming, and although it has only been a few days, I have
already learned a lot! I'll share more details about the job in my next entry!