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SECTOR REPORTS SOFTWARE & TECHNOLOGY: NEXT-GEN WMS

6 Ways WMS Can Improve Operations Getting better results with the latest warehouse management systems. By Maria Hoffman

I n the fast moving world of food and bev-

erage warehouses, reducing spoilage and

improving order and shipment accuracy

is essential for business. Utilizing the

latest warehouse management systems

(WMS) can assist warehouse managers

towards that goal.

Industry drivers Recent government regulations coupled

with the need to manage and increase ware-

house velocity and throughput is driving food

and beverage companies to implement and

upgrade warehouse management systems.

Earlier this year, the FDA rolled out the

Preventative Controls rule, part of the larger

Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) leg-

islation. The proposed regulation will affect

food facilities that manufacture, process, pack

and/or hold food products. Additionally, a

food facility will be required to have a written

food safety plan that monitors and prevents

food contamination issues. Product traceabil-

ity and responsiveness to product recalls are

also big drivers to using WMS.

Growing companies are also attracted to

the benefits of WMS. According to Chad

Collins, chief marketing officer and SVP of

Colorado Springs, Colorado-based Accel-

los, emerging niche food companies that are

experiencing rapid growth are oft:en hindered

by their manual or paper-based processes.

WMS not only alleviates this challenge,

but also provides many other advantages for

food and beverage companies.

The top 6 benefits Keeping the various driving factors in

mind, along with the rising demands of the

fast paced food and beverage industry, there

are variotis gains associated with implement-

ing sofiware solutions such as warehouse

management systems.

Below are the top six ways WMS can

improve operations:

1. Traceability: Food and beverage cus- tomers are looking for ways to keep track of

the freshness of their products from a food

safety perspective and an efficiency perspec-

tive. Warehouse management systems give

food and beverage managers a closer look

into their products and help them determine

what shipments need to ship first due to time

constraints.

"Traceability has been a big initiative for a

lot of food distributors because ofthe obvious

perishability ofthe products and the manage-

ment of expiration dates," says Rik Schrader,

EVP of sales for Piano, Texas-based Retalix.

"The ability to be very proactive in terms of

4 6 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2013 • FOOD LOGISTICS www.foodiogistics.com

making decisions as well as making sure that

mistakes are not repeatable, it's really impor-

tant to these type of operations."

Additionally, in the event of a recall, a

company can effectively locate and assess

what products are potentially contaminated

and where they were sent.

2. Accuracy and Visibility: Warehouse management systems offer better visibility

into the warehouse along with a boost in

order and shipment accuracy. Through a

centralized software system, managers are able

to view the movement of their inventory and

ascertain the accuracy of the shipments.

3. Increased Throughput With Integra- tion: Integration with other software solu- tions and automation systems helps boost

throughput in the warehouse.

"What we're seen in both food and bever-

age is they're very focused on speed," says Eric

Lamphier, senior director of p r o d u a manage-

ment, for Atlanta, Ceorgia-based Manhattan

Associates. "You'll go into a very high-end

fresh operation and they're moving fresh

fruits and vegetables and other fresh prod-

ucts through that facility in just a couple of

hours." WMS provides optimized functional-

ity to handle high levels of complexity and

volume throughput.

4. Improved Labor Productivity: Ware- house management systems can also leverage

the power of labor tnanagement solutions.

These solutions can track warehouse workers'

day-to-day activities, including the work they

complete.

"We can understand what their expected

time is for what they're asked to do [versus]

the actual time," says Lamphier. "Then we

can compare them and rate them based on

their work for the day and have a really nice

tmderstanding of how the workforce is per-

forming. You have associates that will husde

and really make some incremental pay based

on working harder against the standards that

have been outlined."

5. Reduced Paperwork: As mentioned earlier, food and beverage companies can be

hindered by their manual or paper-based pro-

cesses. Reports that were prepared manually

can now be managed electronically.

According to Dan Radunz, senior vice

president of product development for Minne-

apolis, Minnesota-based Highjump, a WMS

can "significantly reduce the paperwork tradi-

tionally associated with warehouse operations,

as well as ensure timely and accurate flow of

inventory and information."

Additionally, creating electronic reports

will boost a company's sustainability efforts.

by creating a greener footprint and lessening

the need for paper.

6. Better Space Utilization: Food and beverage warehouses can improve space uti-

lization due to a speedier fulfillment process

with the use of WMS. With less inventory

in the warehouse, holding costs will decrease

drastically.

"Space utilization can help with ensuring

that we optimally use the space in the facility,

which can eliminate their need to buy more

facility space," says Tom Kozenski, VP indus-

try strategy of Scottsdale, Arizona-based JDA

Software (formerly RedPrairie).

Customer success stories Republic National Distributing Company

(RNDC), the second largest alcohol bever-

age distributor in the U.S., uses Manhattan

Associates' warehouse management solutions

in their operations. According to Stefan

Kirshenbaum, VP and director of distribu-

tion and logistics at RNDC, there were some

challenges during the initial implementation

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www.foodlogtstics.com FOOD LOGISTICS • JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2013 4 7

that took place in Denver, C O .

"The learning curve was a challenge," says

Kirshenbaum. However, "Manhattan pro-

vided complete assistance from the beginning

to the end of that initial implementation of

WMS."

One of the biggest advantages Manhat-

tan Associates' WMS offers to R N D C is

absolute inventory control along with greater

space utilization. R N D C is able to efficiendy

replenish products, which results in improved

productivity for the warehouse crew.

"The ability to do cycle counting rather

than wall-to-wall inventory" is also essential

for inventory management, Kirshenbaum

adds.

R N D C will be starting their ninth instal-

lation of Manhattan's WMS, going live in

February in Louisville, KY. After their ninth

installation, the company has future plans to

install the WMS in another eight locations.

"Our company has a reputation of being at

the forefront of technology and we're proud

of our operations throughout our chain and

Manhattan has been a great partner in pro-

viding a continued effort on our part to be

the best in class distribution network within

our industry," says Kirshenbaum.

Cloverleaf Cold Storage, a Sioux City,

Iowa-based, refrigerated warehouse firm, has

relied on AccellosOne Enterprise 3PL third-

party logistics management software since

2004 to maintain high levels of productivity

and increase profits.

"Accellos' concentration on the 3PL cold

storage market has given them an extraor-

dinary, in-depth awareness of the field and

its challenges, and that is one ofthe primary

reasons we selected them as our 3PL manage-

ment solution," said Curtis Mastbergen, vice

president of administration and finance for

Cloverleaf Cold Storage in a case study. "We

wanted an expert in our field, not a vendor to

whom cold storage was a sideline."

Since implementing the Accellos software

in many Cloverleaf Cold Storage facilities

over the course of almost 10 years, Mast-

bergen noted the software has helped them

to serve their clients both accurately and

efficiently.

"We win a lot of customers with needs

that our competitors can't handle," Mastber-

gen mentioned. "AccellosOne Enterprise 3PL

is a big part of that."

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-based Frank-

ford Candy, a privately owned candy manu-

facturer in the U.S., also utilizes Accellos'

management sofirware. The candy company

was looking to advance their electronic data

interchange (EDI) capabilities to seamlessly

work with trading partners.

"We can bring up a new trading partner in

minutes, where before, it could involve weeks

of frustrating back-and-forth among us, our

EDI vendor and our trading partners," said

executive vice president of Frankford Candy,

Nathan Hoffman in a press release. "Major

retailers have very specific ways of doing

things, and Accellos' EDI for Dynamics AX

accommodates them all very nicely."

Since Frankford Candy has implemented

Accellos One Pinpoint EDI for AX, Hoffman

prefers to rely solely on the resources pro-

vided by the ERP solution.

"The most painful time in any new

technology relationship is at go-live," said

Hoffman. "With the Accellos EDI solution,

it was totally pain-free. There were no lost

orders and no lost invoices—and so no lost

revenue."

Brooklyn and Astoria, New York-based

Empire Merchants, LLC, a distributor of fine

wines and spirits, is the largest wine distribu-

tor in metropohtan New York. The company

Alcohol beverage distributor Republic National Distributing Company (RNDC) uses Manhattan Associates' WMS solutions.

4 8 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2013 • FOOD LOGISTICS www.foodlogistics.com

ships approximately 10,000,000 units per

year. With a high order volume along with

storage capacity concerns. Empire Merchants

turned to CIBER, an integration company, to

better identify what warehouse management

system would suit their needs.

Empire's Brooklyn facility had installed

Highjumps Warehouse Advantage system,

which handles receiving, returns, inventory

and replenishment.

"We chose Highjump Warehouse Advan-

tage as our warehouse management system

and CIBER as our integration partner based

on their previous successful implementations

with other wine and spirits distributors," said

Tony Magliocco, C O O , of Empire Mer-

chants, in a press release.

This system replaced a paper-based replen-

ishment method while improving inventory

accuracy.

"We couldn't have picked a better soft-

ware package and implementation partner

than Highjump warehouse advantage and

CIBER," said Magliocco. "The sofiware is

working as the project team designed it. As

a result, our fill rates have increased and our

distribution costs have decreased dramati-

cally."

What lies ahead? Moving forward, industry experts are

expecting to see a shifting demand for cloud-

based WMS along with other rypes of appli-

cation software. One of the pros of using a

cloud-based WMS is the ability to free up

food and beverage managers from worrying

about servers.

"The market is more open to cloud-

based solutions now more than ever," says

Highjump's Radunz. "This is primarily driv-

en by the desire to focus more IT resources

on core competencies related to serving

customers better, rather than managing an IT

infrastructure."

Further enhancements with supply chain

tracking and tracing will continue to be a

ftjture trend in the industry. With more

stringent food safety standards on the way.

the ability to seamlessly identify and track all

food and beverage items will assist with stay-

ing compliant.

Furthermore, the need for radio frequency

identification (RFID) systems will continue

to rise. An RFID system increases automation

and generates accurate visibility in the ware-

house while concurrently lessening misplaced

food or beverage products.

"As products move through the facil-

ity, we're not going to require the manual

intervention of actually scanning barcodes

or entering information into a mobile com-

puter," says Accellos' Collins. "A lot ofthat

information will be automatically fed into the

warehouse management system via sensors

and other technologies. •

Tony's Fine Foods: Stepping Up With Retalix's WMS

T ony's Fine Foods, locat-

ed in West Sacramento,

California, has been

utilizing Retalix's WMS

solutions since 2003.

Before deploying Retalix's WMS

solutions, the company used their

own in-house WMS. As with most

new software instaliations, Tony's

Fine Foods encountered a few

challenges during the switch to

Retalix's WMS.

"The hardest challenge with

anything is that you're dealing

with a partner that doesn't work

for you," says Mark Geery, CIO of

Tony's Fine Foods. "You have to

really stand up for yourself and

make sure you cover all the areas

that you need to cover. There were

certain parts of the software that

we had customized and made

unique for our needs in our prior

in-house WMS, [so] we had to take

a little bit of a step backwards in

those areas, but the gains of having

a robust system with a company

that can support it offset that."

Warehouse managers at Tony's

Fine Foods, like Pete Moody, see

the upside to working with Retalix's

WMS software. They are able to

seamlessly manage their business

and identify potential sources of

problems in the warehouse. Addi-

tionally, the software heips to prop-

erly manage warehouse employees

by measuring workers' productivity

and accuracy. The WMS becomes

"an extension of them," says Geery.

Another benefit for Tony's Fine

Foods is having a system with real

time inventory and traceability. Pre-

viously, the company would wait for

invoices to post before the inven-

tory would get updated.

"The fact that we've been able

to double the size of our business

in almost the 10 years that we've

been on this WMS is a testimony

that the software's been a suc-

cess," says Geery.

www.foodlogistics.com FOOD LOGISTICS • JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2013 4 9

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