FarmaCorp increases efficiency and supports rapid growth with flexible fulfillment via Cloud-based inventory management
As Bolivia’s leading pharmaceutical retail chain, FarmaCorp had outgrown its inventory management approach. They needed a state-of-the art warehouse management system (WMS) that could support the company’s rapid growth plans in a highly competitive market. With Oracle Warehouse Management Cloud, FarmaCorp has reduced costs, improved lot visibility and increased efficiency.
“For a growing retail company, tracking inventory is the difference between losing money, breaking even and making a profit.”
Business challenges
FarmaCorp is Bolivia’s premier pharmaceutical retail chain with 68 locations. This rapidly growing retailer carries a wide variety of SKUs ranging from pharmaceutical and medical supplies to personal care, cosmetics and toys. Known for its commitment to customer service over the past 76 years, FarmaCorp is constantly working to expand its mission of service excellence to help make life easier for its customer.
FarmaCorp did not have a proper warehouse management system, essentially forcing the company to manage inventory manually. But, as they opened new stores, they began to see obvious limitations in this approach, including a lack of comprehensive visibility over the entire supply chain. For example, once products were in the store, they could not effectively track item location or when to replenish them. With approximately 40 stores across the country at the time, it became increasingly difficult to manage inventory manually.
“For a growing retail company, tracking inventory is the difference between losing money, breaking even and making a profit,” said Andres Valdivieso, FarmaCorp CIO. “We needed a far more sophisticated warehouse management system in order to maintain and grow our business,” Valdivieso continued.
Most importantly, FarmaCorp needed help in three critical areas:
Delivering accurate communication between stores and distribution centers (DCs) for more effective replenishment
Managing critical product expiration dates across the store network to reduce preventable expenditures
Establishing a workforce management system to track employee productivity
Why FarmaCorp Chose Oracle
“After considering solutions from a number of WMS vendors we determined that Oracle Warehouse Management Cloud had the most visionary, cloud-based approach that would support our rapid growth and enable us to maintain our leadership in the market,” said Valdivieso.
Oracle and FarmaCorp worked together as strategic partners. Within 4 months, FarmaCorp implemented Oracle Warehouse Management Cloud. FarmaCorp improved its operations by leveraging Oracle’s innovative capabilities and mobile solutions which enable “on the go” WMS tasks from tablets and RF devices. With the new software, FarmaCorp’s supply chain became fully automated, reducing costs and increasing efficiency.
Results
FarmaCorp has successfully used Oracle Warehouse Management Cloud for two years. FarmaCorp started using in-store inventory in one of their highly-trafficked stores in 2014, and, given the positive results, they plan to expand that technology to all 70 stores by mid-2015.
Before Oracle, FarmaCorp used a large amount of resources to keep their warehouse operations functional. Now, with Oracle’s digital supply chain solution, FarmaCorp requires almost no dedicated resources.
“It’s great to have more efficient operations and true inventory visibility. And since Oracle Warehouse Management Cloud is a cloud-based solution, we’ve minimized our internal resource requirements. We no longer have this huge IT backlog for the warehouse,” added Valdivieso.
With Oracle Warehouse Management Cloud, internal staff is no longer left to guess how much to order, so they can use their time more effectively. And, through greater lot visibility, personnel can more effectively manage products, even pharmaceuticals, which have expiration dates. If pharmaceuticals approaching expiration are automatically returned to suppliers, FarmaCorp can avoid penalty costs and receive full refunds.
With the successful addition of in-store inventory in one of their premier stores, inventory accuracy has already improved. FarmaCorp now has a powerful replenishment model with greatly increased visibility. They can now confidently plan with much more accuracy than ever before.
Using Oracle Warehouse Management Cloud, FarmaCorp is able to keep a pulse on their entire network, provide real-time updates using fewer resources and manage a more complex infrastructure.
“By working with Oracle we’ve truly gained a competitive advantage,” concluded Valdivieso.
This story was originally published on https://www.logfire.com/.