Case Study

Nexus Fulfilment

OrderFlow’s flexible WMS supported Nexus Fulfilment’s move from promotional stock distributor to manager when it won the contract to manage South African Breweries’ promotional material across 49 country-wide depots.

Summary

  • Magento ecommerce integration
  • Managing 49 depots across South Africa
  • Scan & Go feature added

Nexus Fulfilment is a South African-based specialist 3PL company and a long-time OrderFlow customer. Over the years we’ve supported the business’ expansion through our expert knowledge and flexible WMS system, including diversifying its e-fulfilment business into the provision of a 3PL service for a significant customer, South African Breweries (SAB) – part of the ABInBev family.

Three years ago Nexus was awarded a contract to make up and distribute promotional kits to SAB’s 49 country-wide depots. The company was so impressed with the 3PL’s work that it recently extended the contract to include overall management and storage of its promotional stock.

Overseeing management of client stock across 49 regional depots

OrderFlow worked closely with Nexus Fulfilment and our Magento integration partners to provide a solution that allowed the 3PL to manage and ring fence stock allocations on behalf of SAB sales managers, as well as provide a quick checkout process for SAB sales reps collecting stock from depots.

This included employing a storeman at each site and launching a website where sales reps could have stock allocated to them, and nominate a collection time and site says Nexus Fulfilment’s Managing Director Robbie Ferns.

Individual sales reps are now able to log into Nexus Fulfilment’s website interface and order stock, for which the availability is based on not just how much stock is present in the different depots, but on how much has been allocated to and used by each sales manager.

The orders placed on the Magento platform flow into the OrderFlow warehouse management system (WMS), allowing Nexus Fulfilment to make up promotional kits as required and ship them out to the different depots. The kits are received on warehouse handhelds – still within OrderFlow – and held until the sales person arrives at the designated date and time.

“The addition of the website has significantly reduced the time sales reps spend getting promotional stock, in turn enabling them to go out and sell more,” enthuses Nexus’ Managing Director Robbie Ferns.

Completing orders on the fly – scan and go!

A mix of promotional stock is also stored at each site, giving sales managers the flexibility to request additional promotional stock on the fly.

“Perhaps they decide to grab a few extra six t-shirts when they come in to pick up their stock,” says Charlie Armor, OrderFlow’s Managing Director. “We’ve set up a checkout process where each depot’s storeman can scan out ad hoc items ­– the salesperson simply signs on the warehouse handheld to confirm receipt.”

“The ‘scan and go’ feature was designed around shopping as you would in a store,” Robbie continues. “You walk around, choose items you want and they are ‘scanned’ out at the till and packed immediately.”

Ongoing support

Paul Watson, Nexus’ Head of IT, is grateful for the continued support our partnership offers.

“I appreciated the availability of the OrderFlow team and how responsive they were throughout the project to the tickets that were logged,” he says. “We were able to quickly discern the root causes of the challenges that we encountered and the team was on hand to promptly recommend and implement the necessary remediations.

Offering national stock management service

Since the management project went live Nexus has also won business with Diageo and Pernod Ricard, making it the leading 3PL in this market. It now plans to push out this national distribution and stock management model to additional clients – existing and new.

“This is a great way for logistics businesses to expand their offering,” says Charlie. “With this project we’ve proven OrderFlow’s wide-ranging capabilities yet again, highlighting the variety of ways a flexible WMS can support warehousing needs.

“If other logistics organisations are interested in seeing how we can support them in managing field distribution centres or providing country-wide depot management then please get in touch!”

"I’ve found that OrderFlow is a company that not only has a flexible WMS, but also a truly responsive and knowledgeable customer support team."
Paul Watson | Head of IT
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