One thing I’ve spent a lot of time on over the last five years is rethinking what it means to be “recall ready.” It is a term that gets used constantly in food safety. Most companies would say they are recall ready because they have a plan and procedures. They can point to a document that says what should happen if something goes wrong. Maybe they even ran a mock recall. But it only takes one real recall for them to realize they weren’t as prepared as they thought.
Those who know me know that I like to think in metaphors, and I’ve found a new one that’s helpful here: bandaids.
For a long time, recall readiness has been treated like a bandaid kept in a drawer. You hope you never need it, but you feel better knowing it’s there. When an injury happens, you pull it out, slap it on, and assume you’ve dealt with the problem. The bleeding slows, the pain eases, and everyone moves on.
But bandaids don’t heal wounds! Sure, you could make a case for their psychological benefits, especially when toddlers are involved. You could even argue that they are effective with minor wounds, like a papercut or skinned knee. But recalls are rarely minor. Although helpful for containing the immediate crisis, the bandaid approach to recall readiness gives the illusion that something has been fixed when it hasn’t. Once the moment has passed, nothing about the underlying readiness of the supply chain has changed.
The “bandaid” mindset is typically how recalls are handled at the supplier level. The focus is on getting through the event, not on whether the system itself is prepared to manage it. It comes from a desire to believe that risk is occasional, manageable, and largely contained. But today’s supply chains face constant disruption. Supply chains are global, complex, and exposed to political tension, regulatory pressure, cyber threats, and a steady stream of recalls that move faster than most systems were designed to handle.
With the bandaid metaphor, we could easily talk about preventing recalls, but that would be the equivalent of not getting wounded in the first place (certainly what every parent hopes for their toddler). For now, let’s assume the injury happened – the question becomes how to treat the wound so it heals.
What actually treats a supply chain “wounded” by a recall is readiness that is built before anything went wrong. Readiness is the difference between reacting and responding. It shows up in how quickly information is shared, how clearly responsibilities are understood, and how consistently action is taken across every trading partner involved.
Readiness connects supply chains. It replaces outdated plans with systems that support action. It allows recall information to move quickly and accurately from supplier to consumer instead of relying on improvisation. It gives every partner, regardless of size or role, the ability to do the right thing without friction.
Bandaids feel comforting because they suggest control. They are familiar and make it easy to believe we are prepared. If recall readiness is going to mean something real, it has to move beyond covering the problem and toward building the kind of resilience that allows the supply chain to respond, recover, and protect consumers when disruption inevitably happens.
