Granngården, a nationwide Swedish retail chain in the pets and gardening sector, has chosen RELEX to streamline the flow of goods to its central warehouse and its 100+ stores.
Granngården had already achieved a high degree of supply chain automation before approaching RELEX. The company already made use of features including automatic ordering from its retail outlets and forecast-based automated purchase suggestions for the central warehouse. Nonetheless, it was clear that its inventory management system didn’t have the power and features needed to help Granngården achieve its development goals.
Henrik Larsson, head of supply chain at Granngården, says: “Although Granngården has, over the years, already automated parts of its supply chain, there are still key areas where we spend a lot of time on tasks that would better be handled by the system. With the help of RELEX’s supply chain management system forecasting and order proposals will be far more accurate and the flow of both regular goods and, above all seasonal- and campaign-related goods will be largely automated. The wide range of tools the system provides will also save a lot of our time.”
“With the help of RELEX’s supply chain management system forecasting and order proposals will be far more accurate and the flow of both regular goods and, above all seasonal- and campaign-related goods will be largely automated.”
The first step was to integrate the new RELEX system with Granngården’s existing ERP system, Movex, to facilitate the rapid introduction of the new inventory management solution. Then, when Granngården introduces a new ERP system, Dynamics AX, the integration interfaces will be moved over to the new ERP.
“RELEX showed us how cost-effective bringing our new purchasing and replenishment system into service could be even before we introduced the new ERP system,” says Dag Widell, IT Manager at Granngården. “We started using the RELEX solution even before our switch to Dynamics AX making it easier to ensure that the switch is managed effectively and has the maximum impact. At the same time, we reduce the workload on the Granngården team when we introduce the new ERP system.”
The implementation of the RELEX supply chain management system is already in full swing. “From the outset, in the specification phase, we could tell that RELEX’s experts didn’t just truly know their system, they also understood our business and how inventory management works in parallel with our other processes,” says Gina Hedqvist, Granngården’s supply chain project leader. “Our RELEX partners have made lots of useful suggestions about how we can improve our processes and routines and have helped us with questions that go beyond the areas directly related to the RELEX system.”
“We could tell that RELEX’s experts didn’t just truly know their system, they also understood our business and how inventory management works in parallel with our other processes.”
RELEX co-founder and Head of Scandinavian Operations, Johanna Småros, is full of praise for the Granngården team. “Granngården’s people are fantastic to work with. They are incredibly open to new ideas and to the challenge and potential of change. There’s a palpable feeling that we are working together to achieve common goals.”