Company News • 18.02.2009

Less Work for the Stock Manager – Lower Costs for the Retailer

natura and SAF report at the EuroCIS about the advantages of automated replenishment

The advantages for retailers and their employees of converting from manual to automated replenishment are obvious. “SAF software dramatically reduces the number of items that a stock manager must watch and thus significantly improves replenishment quality,” assesses Andrzej Uryga, Board Member and Commercial Director of natura Drogeria.

With approx. 280 stores, the second largest beauty chain in Poland, natura handles about 4.5 million order lines per week. In the past, a new replenishment list was released about every three minutes, each list produced tediously by hand. In contrast, SAF forecasting software only highlights striking replenishment proposals, for example, items with imminent zero inventories, as exceptions. In doing so, the system enables store operators to concentrate on ten to twenty items per day. They no longer have to manually review hundreds of individual replenishment orders.

natura had to optimize its replenishment processes to be ready for strong growth in the Polish market. Simplifying the store operator’s daily work while optimizing inventory levels and the associated capital commitment were key objectives targeted. In addition, natura also focused on reducing out of stocks. That’s why natura decided to convert to automated replenishment with the SAF forecasting and ordering system. Urgya gave insight into the challenges and initial successes of the conversion to an audience of industry professions last week at the EuroCIS, the leading trade fair for information technology and security in retail.

Following implementation of SAF SuperStore in 12 pilot stores last December, more than 200 stored have “gone live” within the last two months. The beauty chain is already achieving notable successes just two months after the conversion. There were hardly any out of stocks during the Christmas season, the most difficult replenishment period of the year for stock managers. All required excess inventory items were reduced to typical levels and the warehouse returned to pre-Christmas stock levels already by mid-January – a clear indication of how precisely automated replenishment fulfilled customer demand.

“By introducing SAF software, we were able to optimize both our warehouse inventories and their quality, as well as to realize initial increases in sales,” says Uryga in commenting on the advantages of the new system. “Most importantly, we have enormously improved product availability. That makes customers happy and, in the long run, that’s crucial for every retailer.”

channels