The FAFH Glossary
The Food Away From Home (FAFH) industry is powered by its own unique language. Use this glossary to understand the key terms and concepts that drive our go-to-market intelligence solutions and the industry at large.
A
Alias
One of the many names for an entity found in source data. In the FAFH ecosystem, a single operator location can have many transactional account and member numbers. These multiple identities are mastered to a single identifier (the OPTRADE ID).
Alias Management / Alias Resolution
The process of identifying and merging multiple name variations for a single operator location into one master record. This resolves data discrepancies to ensure a clean, unified view of every operator, which is the foundation for accurate trade spend management.
Apples to Apples Comparison
A view in the Sales Module that ensures last year’s data contains the same number of fiscal weeks as current year data, allowing for accurate Year-over-Year (YOY) analysis.
Attribute
A piece of information indicating the properties of a field or tag in a database, allowing for organized grouping of information. Attributes can include Operator attributes (e.g., location, GPO affiliation) or Distribution Center attributes (e.g., region, territory).
B
Billback
A payment from the manufacturer to the distributor after the distributor sells a specific product volume to an operator, often as part of a trade agreement.
C
Case Volume
The number of product cases sold or shipped.
Category White Space
A type of untapped sales opportunity that identifies Operator Ship-To locations that are buying some of your product categories, but not a specific product category you select.
Commercial Operator
An end user or establishment whose primary purpose is to prepare and sell food (e.g., a local diner or restaurant chain).
Contract Pricing
Pre-negotiated pricing agreements between a manufacturer and an operator or buying group.
D
Data Collaboration
The strategic integration of diverse data sources from various entities to generate deeper, more insightful answers than any single source could provide.
Data Ecosystem
A system where different data sources and platforms are interconnected to create a unified, valuable signal. Tibersoft's OPTRADE is an example of an FAFH data ecosystem.
Data Latency
The delay between when a transaction occurs and when that data becomes available for reporting and decision-making.
Data Visibility
The ability to see and access data in a clear and timely manner.
Direct Sales
Sales made directly from a manufacturer to a very large operator, bypassing intermediaries like distributors.
Distributor
An intermediary that buys products from manufacturers, stores them in distribution centers, and sells them to operators.
Double-Dipping
The improper claim of the same rebate or discount by more than one party, or by the same party more than once, leading to trade spend leakage.
E
Execution Engine
A data platform designed to drive daily sales and trade activity, not just high-level market research.
Explore
A dashboard within the ExplorePRO application that allows users to inquire into a subject in detail, deep dive into sales and claim data, and get a holistic view of business health.
ExplorePRO
The application containing Tibersoft’s client tools.
F
Food Away from Home (FAFH)
Meals consumed outside of the home, including at restaurants, cafeterias, schools, and hospitals.
G
GPO (Group Purchasing Organization)
An organization that leverages the collective purchasing power of its members to negotiate trade contracts and pricing with manufacturers and distributors on behalf of smaller-scale operators.
I
Indirect Sales
Sales made through distributors rather than directly from the manufacturer to the operator.
L
Location White Space
Untapped sales opportunities that identify Operator Ship-To locations that have not purchased from you but have purchased from another OPTRADE community manufacturer within the past 12 months.
M
Mastering (Data Mastering)
The process of tying all the different ways an item, location, or trade program is presented in different systems into one, unified format. The Tibersoft Data Mastering Team links these different descriptions back to a master description.
N
Non-Commercial Operator
An end user or establishment whose primary purpose is not the sale of food (e.g., hospitals, K-12 schools, university dining halls).
O
Operator
The end user or establishment that prepares and serves food, such as a restaurant, hospital kitchen, or school cafeteria.
Operator-Level Data
Purchase data that is tied to a specific, named, and geo-tagged operator location, as opposed to aggregated data.
OPTRADE
Tibersoft's proprietary FAFH data collaborative. For over 15 years, it has brought together manufacturer, distributor, and operator data to create a shared, holistic view of the market. It serves as a shared Operator Location database that uses claim data to link the many transactional account numbers a location has to one master OPTRADE ID.
OpX & My OpX
An index value between 1-100 indicating the relative purchasing activity of an OPTRADE Operator Ship-To location. OpX compares a location to all locations in the OPTRADE database, while My OpX compares it only to locations that have purchased from you.
R
Rebate
A payment from a manufacturer to an operator based on the terms outlined in a trade contract.
Redistributor
An intermediary that buys products from manufacturers and resells them in smaller quantities to other distributors, not directly to operators.
S
Sales Hierarchy
A hierarchy based on master data files exchanged between a manufacturer and Tibersoft that organizes sales data (e.g., by Zone, Region, Broker, Sales Rep).
Segments
The type or category of operator being served, such as Commercial (restaurants) or Non-Commercial (schools, hospitals).
SKU (Stock Keeping Unit)
A unique identifier for each distinct product item.
T
Trade Agreements Financial arrangements, such as rebates or billbacks, between manufacturers, operators, and distributors to incentivize large-quantity purchases.
Transaction-Verified Data
Data sourced from actual purchase events, such as trade claims and distributor velocity files, as distinct from modeled or inferred data.
True Cases / True Volume
The "true," or actual, number of units sold, measured in cases, pounds, or sales dollars. Sales volume derived from trade claim data is often overstated due to duplicates and unverified transactions. OPTRADE adjusts this by de-duplicating and verifying data to arrive at a more precise measure of sales volume.
U
Unit of Measure (UOM)
Quantitative measurements through which users can view data at different levels, such as Ship-To Count, True Cases, Footprint, and Penetration.
V
Velocity Data
Product sell-through data shared by a Distributor, Operator, or GPO with a Manufacturer, typically at the location level.
