Sacha Vaughan, chief supply chain officer at houseware manufacturer Joseph Joseph, is in a fortunate position – her board recognises the critical role of the supply chain in a digital age, which she suggests isn’t always the case.
“Many brands see the supply chain as simply moving boxes from one place to another,” she says. “The consensus is often that, ‘It’s not that difficult.’ However, we’ve had some pain in the past. The board realises that the supply chain is more than just moving boxes from A to B, and it’s a huge lever for cost control. Therefore, they treat the supply chain strategically.”
Vaughan says this recognition of the importance of product fulfilment isn’t just a result of internal cost pressures. She suggests supply chain chiefs have had an interesting decade, characterised by a series of disruptions, including the coronavirus pandemic, Brexit and the implementation of new tariffs following the change in US administration.
“We’ve been fortunate and unfortunate at the same time,” she says. “The world has been particularly volatile from a supply chain perspective. However, the impact of these disruptions has helped to elevate the supply chain from the basement into the boardroom.”
Embracing supply chain transformation
Vaughan joined Joseph Joseph in February 2025. Having fulfilled senior operations roles with Forma, Charlotte Tilbury and Shiseido, her previous position was as global operations and manufacturing director at Dyson. She was approached about the opportunity to become chief supply chain officer at Joseph Joseph and was impressed after a discussion with the firm’s co-founder, co-owner and CEO, Richard Joseph.
“I was sold the moment I met him,” she says. “He’s super smart and a great businessman who’s really clear on what he wants. He was someone I knew I could work for, and I bought into his vision. I absolutely love the product, and the founders – both Richard and Anthony – are delightful to work with.”
Vaughan recognises there are similarities between her current and former employers, as both are design-led businesses where the founders remain heavily involved. However, climbing higher up the career ladder at Dyson required a move to Singapore. She says joining Joseph Joseph allowed her to achieve her career aspirations in the UK at an organisation she admired.
“Chief supply chain officer was definitely my trajectory – it was the role I wanted,” she says. “And they were offering that opportunity at an exciting time. They were looking for someone to completely transform their supply chain, not do more of the same. I really believed in that vision. And seven months later, that’s exactly what we’ve done.”
Vaughan says the supply chain she inherited was a bit underdeveloped. She describes the existing supply chain as sedentary and traditional – she was given the remit to drive changes and create a modern, technology-enabled approach. Vaughan is focusing on transformation with the aim of developing an award-winning supply chain.
“That’s the motivation,” she says. “We’re not there now, but we will be. The talent within Joseph Joseph is quite phenomenal. I have a team of 50 people. We’re not a huge company, and yet we’re taking the supply chain seriously. And within that team, I have some smart individuals that I’m just grateful to work with every day.”
Making the most of digital and data
Vaughan reports to Richard Joseph and is a member of the executive board. She manages the end-to-end supply chain and the strategic sourcing of the firm’s products, which draws on the specialist procurement team under her wing.
“So, the beautiful designs that we come up with in London, we go and find somebody who can manufacture that product to our high standards,” she says. “It’s about ensuring we can do that task at the right price and time.” Other areas of responsibility include demand and supply planning, customer service and order management.
Digital and data play a crucial role in modern supply chain operations at Joseph Joseph. “Technology becomes more critical every month as things move on,” she says. “Ultimately, the world is too complex these days for us to have someone handing around pieces of paper. We need to be systemically controlled.”
“Technology becomes more critical every month as things move on. Ultimately, the world is too complex these days for us to have someone handing around pieces of paper. We need to be systemically controlled”
Sacha Vaughan, Joseph Joseph
The company’s enterprise resource planning (ERP) system runs on SAP. While this platform is critical for day-to-day operations, Vaughan says other areas of IT supporting the supply chain need work. However, dealing with that situation carefully is part of her long-term plan to transform the company’s operational activities.
“I’ve purposely kept us a little bit undeveloped this year because I want to work out how we want to run things here. I think some organisations jump into picking the new shiny technology and then try to bend their processes around what that technology can do, and you end up with suboptimal supply chains,” she says.
“What I want to do is be super clear on aims. Then we’ll go shopping for the right systems that meet those requirements, as opposed to buying a demand planning system that doesn’t deliver what the business needs. I want end-to-end integrations with systems that all work in the same direction and talk to each other seamlessly.”
Vaughan says that making those decisions will rely on working out how to integrate with customers and suppliers, allied to a careful consideration of how suppliers can help the business manage its inventory in the future: “We are looking at everything as an area of opportunity while we work out how we do things around here.”
Working with trusted partners
When it comes to the general direction of travel for supply chain technology at Joseph Joseph, Vaughan says application programming interfaces (APIs) are already the standard way of communicating with partner organisations. She’s interested in exploring the potential of emerging technology, such as artificial intelligence (AI), at the right time for the business.
“We have some elements of AI in our demand planning area, where we make predictions about what our customers are going to buy and when they’re going to buy it,” she says. “I think that’s a basic way of using AI, but there are more possibilities that we can leverage. However, they’re not firmly on our roadmap at the moment.”
Vaughan says any decision to use emerging technology is made in concert with the company’s IT director. Her team works closely with the technology department. While the IT department might like to move faster, Vaughan says it’s important to temper expectations as she sets her supply chain strategy in stone.
“They’re like, ‘Oh, Sacha, this is all the great technology out there that we could use.’ And I’m saying, ‘Yeah, that looks good. However, just let me get my house in order.’ I don’t want to put sticky plasters over things and have a problem recur in six months. [I want to] take a step back and fix our business challenges with technology forever,” she says.
I don’t want to put sticky plasters over things and have a problem recur in six months. [I want to] take a step back and fix our business challenges with technology forever Sacha Vaughan, Joseph Joseph
One of Vaughan’s most important moves was to establish a new partnership for third-party distribution centres in the UK. Her team ran a major procurement exercise after she joined in February. In July, Joseph Joseph’s end-to-end supply chain partnership with XPO Logistics became operational, and technology plays a key role in the approach.
“Everything’s got to be well controlled,” she says. “I was looking for a third-party partner who could ensure that we’re properly, systemically controlled. The data interface between us and XPO is seamless, with the right data in the right place at the right time, and interfaces that support our business, rather than a scrambled approach.”
Focusing on core activities
Joseph Joseph ships its stock to XPO’s third-party distribution centre in Rugby, where the logistics firm manages omnichannel fulfilment, warehousing, pre-retailing and distribution services for customers – both major retailers and individual consumers. Vaughan says the partnership allows her team to focus on growing the business rather than firefighting.
“You’ve got to know where your business is and what is core to you and where you want to focus,” she says. “I firmly believe that if you get the right partner, then logistics becomes a quiet part of the business. Because it’s the end of the chain, it can be super noisy. However, when fulfilment goes well, nobody talks about it, it’s super quiet, and you can get on with the stuff that’s going to control your costs and grow your business.”
Vaughan recognises that some companies choose to take control of fulfilment internally. In many cases, particularly for large firms, she says that’s a misguided approach. Successful digital transformation is a tricky process, and using the knowledge of an expert like XPO Logistics means her team can help Joseph Joseph deliver better customer experiences.
“Warehouse management systems are expensive – they take a lot of development, and a lot of technology is required to make things seamless,” she says. “It’s a lot of work running the distribution centres, and it’s a distraction from your core business. Giving this responsibility to people who are experts, and who can do it in a sustainable, repeatable, scalable way, is much more efficient, especially for a growing business.”
Vaughan reflects on the changes she’s seen during her time on the operational front line and is positive about the role of supply chain officers in the digital age. As more boards wake up to the opportunity to use high-quality fulfilment as a strategic lever for growth, she says the opportunities for her peers are significant, so long as they recognise the important role of digital transformation.
She says: “We need to think about key questions, such as, ‘How can you start with the customer and work back to make things frictionless?’ That’s where technology and supply chain should be focused. More and more, that’s the direction of travel, and supply chain leaders who are successful will be the ones who are really focused on the customer.”
Memo may not be the world’s fastest barista, but it is impressive—for a robot.
I recently watched as Memo, a new home robot from a company called Sunday Robotics, made coffee in an open-plan kitchen in Mountain View, California.
Memo looks like something out of Wall-E, with a gleaming white body, two arms, a friendly cartoonish face, and a red baseball cap. Rather than using legs as a fully humanoid robot would, Memo moves around using a wheeled platform and changes its height by sliding up and down a central column atop that platform.
The robot responded to a request for an espresso by rolling over to a countertop, and then using two pincerlike hands to slowly go through each step required to operate an espresso machine. It filled the porta filter with coffee grounds, tamped them down, slotted the porta filter into place and put a coffee cup below, pressed the buttons needed to start the machine, and finally retrieved the hot drink.
“We want to build robots that free people from laundry, from the dishes, from all chores,” Tony Zhao, cofounder and CEO of Sunday Robotics, told me as the robot brought the coffee over to the person who requested it.
Making a cup of espresso might not seem spectacular, but the feat is ridiculously hard for a robot to do in a real, messy kitchen. It requires the ability to identify different objects, figure out how to grasp them reliably, and use those objects properly. Sunday is not only building its own hardware but also training the models that allow its system to learn. “We think the way to make a home robot is to be full-stack, and to vertically integrate,” Zhao says. “And that’s a very ambitious thing to do.”
The list above has been carefully curated to include our favorites. But we test so many gadgets! Here are more accessories worth exploring.
Anker MagGo Magnetic Charging Station (8-in-1) for $60: This little orb has three AC outlets, two USB-A ports, and two USB-C ports on the back, while the front is home to a Qi2 wireless charging pad to recharge your phone. It’s ideal if you have a lot of gadgets at your workstation that constantly need to be plugged in. The USB-A ports output 12 watts, and the USB-C ports can output 67 watts.
Satechi M1
Photograph: Brenda Stolyar
Satechi M1 Wireless Mouse for $30: This is one of my favorite mice. I’ve been using it with the MacBook Air (M4), the Mac Mini (M4), and the iPad Air (M3). Although I keep it at my desk most of the time, I also throw it in my bag to travel with because it’s so lightweight. The ergonomic design is comfortable in my palm, even after a long workday. The buttons are also responsive, and the scroll wheel is nice and smooth. I also love that the Type-C port is on the front of the mouse, which means you can continue to use it while it’s plugged in.
Nuphy Halo75 V2 for $130: Even if you have the iMac, which comes with Apple’s Magic Keyboard, you can always upgrade to a third-party option, like a mechanical keyboard. If I had the means, I’d buy the Nuphy Halo75 V2 in every color. You can choose from various switches (you can listen to the typing sounds of each one here). I went with Raspberry, which has a creamy sound but offers enough tactile feedback that’s comfortable for typing all day. You can connect the keyboard via Bluetooth, 2.4 GHz, or USB-C. I have it in the cute pink (Sakura Fizz), but it’s also available in Mojito, Iconic White, Obsidian Black, and Blue Lagoon.
Logitech MX Mechanical Mini for Mac for $160: This is the Mac version of Logitech’s MX keyboard. It has a Do Not Disturb key along with the ability to program the function row key with Apple’s own apps like Keynote, Photos, Safari, Final Cut Pro, and more. It only comes with tactile quiet switches, which are ideal if you work around other people. They’re still satisfying to type on, and it’s lightweight and slim enough to travel with, too.
Satechi Dual-Sided Eco-Leather Deskmate for $28: Satechi’s desk mat is made of polyurethane leather that looks pretty and allows for your mouse to glide smoothly over the top. It’s dual-sided, too, so you can flip between colors if you want to change it up.
Ugreen Revodok Pro 211 Docking Station for $55: This is a mix between a dock and a hub. It comes with three USB ports (one USB-C and two USB-A) that hit up to 900 MB/s of data transfer speeds in testing. It’s great if you have a multi-monitor setup at your desk, with the ability to also connect it to a keyboard, mouse, and headphones.
The device has no moving parts, with just a 3.5-inch touchscreen that covers its face and a few buttons on each side. These include power and volume buttons, and the now standard pair of “talk” buttons—one to recognize your partner’s voice and one for your own. In many modes, you won’t need to use these, however. Like most handheld translators, the unit includes a preloaded SIM 4G card that gives it near-global usability. (Vasco says it works “in nearly 200 countries,” which is a lot, since there are only 195 widely recognized nations today.) 2.4-GHz and 5-GHz Wi-Fi are also available when you’re in range of a hot spot or at a hotel.
The 2,500-mAh battery charges via USB-C. Vasco claims that the Q1 offers “many hours of intensive use” and up to 160 hours on standby—though note the battery will drain faster than you might expect even when it’s idling. “Many hours” in my testing was less than eight, but the 160-hour standby metric was roughly accurate.
Language support is robust, but details vary based on how you use the device. For voice-to-voice translation, it supports 86 languages. For text-based translation, that goes up to 108. Oddly, photo-based translations work with 113 languages. Lastly, real-time call translation has support for just 53 languages. I’ll get to each of these in a bit.
After a quick setup, the Q1 drops you into a straightforward interface that lines up its six functions, one over the other. In addition to the four modes mentioned above, the system offers a group chat feature that can support up to 100 participants in their own languages, and a basic learning mode that simply quizzes you on vocabulary, Duolingo style.
Chatty Cathy
Photograph: Chris Null
Most users will likely spend the bulk of their time in conversation mode, which lets you carry on a one-on-one voice discussion with a real-life partner, each in the language of your choice. As is common for handheld translators, holding down one of two buttons—either the pair on the side mentioned earlier or another pair that appears on the touchscreen—lets you tell the Q1 who is talking.
-Reviewer-Photo-SOURCE-Brenda-Stolyar.jpg)
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