Amplifying Supplier Diversity

We aim to have our suppliers represent the customers and consumers we serve and believe this is critical for innovation and business success. The program supports economic growth for minority, women, veteran, LGBTQ and disabled person-owned businesses. As roughly 90 percent of our business is in the U.S., we continue to place the largest focus of our efforts in this region.

To promote and educate on supplier diversity across our business, we operate a Supplier Diversity Roundtable with representatives from each procurement area. Additionally, our procurement contracts request that our suppliers also utilize diverse suppliers and report their diverse spend to Hershey. We track our spend quarterly with both our diverse Tier 1 suppliers (those directly supplying us with goods and services) and Tier 2 suppliers (those who supply our Tier 1 suppliers).

Our Supplier Diversity Strategy paves the way for future growth and development and focuses on:

• Growing our diverse supplier network and spend by identifying a larger base of diverse suppliers that we can include in RFPs
  
• Investing in development opportunities for diversely owned businesses to increase their ability to compete and meet Hershey’s quality requirements
  
• Engaging with key stakeholders internally and externally to strengthen our supplier diversity program

Register as a Diverse Supplier

Hershey uses the ConnXus database to identify certified diverse suppliers to include in our business activities. If you are a diversely owned enterprise and are interested in doing business with Hershey, please go to the ConnXus website to register in their database. Registration is free and enables suppliers to be contacted by ConnXus’s wide range of corporate clients.

For more information, please contact: responsiblesourcing@hersheys.com