SOLAR SWEDEN AB

December 30, 2019

Outsourcing streamlines inventory management and reduces administration for Solar’s customers

Sourcing and service company Solar offers a wide range of services that optimize its customers’ operations – one of which is that Solar allows customers to do away with administration and instead let Solar take over inventory and order management. A task that has ensured that the necessary goods are always in stock with the help of an online scanner solution for electronic goods registration and automatic reordering.

One of Solar’s customers in Sweden is SCA Ortvikens Pappersbruk in Sundsvall, where some of Solar’s electrical supplies are permanently stocked. Solar has taken over the entire inventory management and now owns the local warehouse at SCA Ortviken, which consists of more than 400 different electrical supplies. Solar now handles the heavy and time-consuming tasks such as order management, ordering, replenishment and status with fixed delivery days during the week. In this way, the order system at SCA Ortviken has become much more systematic and dynamic.

– The switch to the dynamic warehouse has worked well right from the start. All inventory management of the electrical items from Solar is now completely automatic. We don’t have to do all the administration, and Solar handles the task for us instead. We simply register when we take an item from the warehouse using a mobile PDA where we scan the item. The system then automatically tells us if we need to order more items. In principle, we don’t need to think about the process – Solar makes sure we have the goods we need,” says Martin Näslund, Supply Coordinator at SCA Underhåll in Sundsvall.

"It's about being able to follow and adapt the entire flow to the customer's needs. The scanner solution is online, so when the warehouse registers that they are taking an item, the system is automatically notified and the inventory is adjusted accordingly."

Malin Lindgren, Customer Logistics Manager, Solar Sverige AB.

DYNAMIC INVENTORY SAVES TIME

Solar and SCA Ortviken have jointly set reorder points for the individual items in relation to the required minimum quantities. When an item reaches the reorder point, an order is automatically placed in the system. This helps save time at the head office at SCA Ortviken. The number of stocked items is adjusted as needed, as the dynamic solution makes it easy to add and remove items. The manual ordering system also still exists, so extra orders can still be made if an urgent need arises.

– We offer the operational service of handling inventory management to save time on the entire purchasing process. This eliminates the risk of a particular item being out of stock. You just go down to the warehouse and pick up the item in question. SCA Orviken therefore avoids having to make purchases on an ongoing basis and avoids unnecessary waiting time for delivery of goods,” says Malin Lindgren, Customer Logistics Manager at Solar Sverige AB.

On a daily basis, Malin Lindgren acts as a link between Solar’s logistics services and customer needs. Malin Lindgren has also been involved in implementing the dynamic warehouse at SCA Ortviken.

ONLINE SCANNER SOLUTION CREATES VALUE INSTANTLY

The dynamic warehouse solution is flexible and can be implemented at all types of companies. Using an online and Android-based scanner solution, the local warehouse at SCA Ortviken talks directly to the system.

– It’s about being able to follow and adapt the entire flow to the customer’s needs. The scanner solution is online, so when the warehouse registers that they are taking an item, the system is automatically notified and the stock level is adjusted accordingly. In this way, we can create value immediately as we can follow the stock balance and ensure that the goods are available at all times,” explains Malin Lindgren.

LESS ADMINISTRATION IN EVERYDAY LIFE

When implementing the local warehouse at SCA Ortviken, the fixed reorder points were defined based on the history of previous product consumption to get an idea of the actual need in the warehouse. New deliveries and replenishment of goods are handled by Solar’s employees from the local store in Sundsvall. The daily administration is thus significantly reduced for the warehouse staff at SCA.

– In reality, we don’t actually need to contact Solar on a daily basis. We’re only in dialog if we want to add more items to the warehouse or change reorder points. But other than that, things just run as they should,” Martin Näslund concludes.

ABOUT SOLAR SVERIGE AB

Solar Sverige AB is part of the Solar Group, one of Europe’s leading sourcing and service companies. Solar is primarily active in electrical, plumbing and ventilation technology with over 215,000 part numbers in stock. The core business is about delivery, service and optimization of customers’ operations. Solar Sweden has approximately 650 employees and serves customers from 48 local stores and two central warehouses – Gällivare in the north and Malmö in the south.