Navigating Inflation in a World of Volatility: How Procurement Can Move from Firefighting to Strategy

Key takeaways from Beroe’s latest In the Know: Product Showcase webinar on strategic inflation management 

Inflation continues to be one of the most persistent challenges facing procurement and finance teams. Input costs are fluctuating, budgets are under pressure, and volatility has become the new baseline for planning. Opening Beroe’s latest In the Know: Product Showcase webinar, Sunny Makhija, Associate Director of Product Marketing, noted that “managing inflation is one of the top priorities for CPOs… Yet many teams are still reacting rather than managing it proactively.” 

Bringing together a panel of inflation experts, the discussion covered how organizations can transition from reactive cost control to a smarter, strategic approach grounded in data, visibility and predictability. 

The session explored Beroe’s Inflation Watch solution, our digital-first inflation management platform, which gives procurement and finance teams real-time visibility into market and contract inflation, scenario modelling capability, and actionable negotiation insights. 

Why inflation is a multi-dimensional challenge 

Setting the stage, Shailesh Bhadauria, Beroe’s VP Analytics Product & Solutions highlighted the continued uncertainty facing global procurement functions: rising input costs, supply disruption scenarios, tariff pressures, and difficulty forecasting budgets with confidence.  

He also noted the importance of inflation management across three pillars: 

• Strategic and budget planning 
• Pricing strategy and margin protection 
• Financial control, risk mitigation, and negotiation leverage 

Live polling of webinar participants reinforced these challenges, with 58% of attendees selecting rising supplier prices and margin pressure as their top pain point. 

Why traditional inflation management approaches fall short 

Procurement functions often still rely on outdated spreadsheets, siloed data, manual processes, and lagging indicators, leaving teams blindsided when inflation shifts. According to Bhadauria “the data rests in silos, processes remain manual and organizations lack the ability to simulate different situations.” 

This disconnect led Beroe to develop an end-to-end framework which addresses both sides of the inflation equation by giving organizations a detailed overview of market inflation factors – how raw materials, energy, logistics, labor and macro factors move – and contract inflation – how pricing mechanisms, benchmark indices, and escalation clauses translate into actual pricing changes. 

Together, these give procurement teams comprehensive visibility into how pricing will evolve across categories, suppliers, regions, and business units. 

Inflation Watch: Turning inflation into foresight rather than surprise 

Hemant Bansal, Principal Product Manager at Beroe, walked webinar participants through a live demo of Inflation Watch, showcasing how CFOs, CPOs and category managers can use it to plan budgets, prepare negotiations, forecast scenarios, and uncover cost savings. He highlighted: 

1. Budgeting & planning as a single source of truth 

A customized watchlist mapped to SKUs, suppliers, and internal taxonomies that gives a real-time view of spend evolution, and top inflationary/deflationary categories that allows users to see what’s coming, quantify its impact, and respond efficiently. 

2. Negotiation readiness: From ‘what is the price?’ to ‘why is it moving?’ 

According to Bansal, Inflation Watch shifts the conversation from ‘what is the price?’ to ‘why is it moving and what can I do about it?’ 

The system also provides AI-enabled recommendations on market levers, cost avoidance opportunities, risk mitigation actions, and best-fit negotiation strategies. 

3. Scenario modeling: Answering ‘what if?’ fast 

The platform’s simulation engine lets teams model different scenarios, for example, a 10% spike in the price of a commodity, and instantly see portfolio and category-level impact, risk concentration and opportunities to hedge, renegotiate, or delay buying. 

Contract inflation: The second critical lens 

Addressing contract inflation, the panel agreed that most organizations have 40%–60% of spend under contract, meaning pricing changes depend heavily on factors such as indexation mechanisms to project what contract inflation will look like. 

Beroe’s contract inflation engine covers 18,000+ cost drivers, giving teams comprehensive visibility into future pricing, which was identified as the top capability gap by 35% of webinar participants: 

Commenting on this, Bhadauria noted that the “the need for real-time visibility and the ability to act on market signals” are major challenges being voiced in client conversations.

From firefighting to forward planning

Summing up, the panel agreed that, while inflation isn’t going away, procurement teams can mitigate its effects and even position their organizations to take control of it.

Beroe’s dual-lens approach, covering market and contract inflation, equips organizations to improve forecast accuracy, strengthen supplier negotiations, boost procurement efficiency, reduce risk exposure, and protect margins in volatile markets.

Watch the full webinar and explore Inflation Watch 

Including live demonstrations of Inflation Watch, contract vs. market inflation tools, and scenario modelling.