Clever systems integration from Balloon One is helping Premium Timber Products to process and fulfil hundreds of daily customer orders in record time. The joinery products specialist supplies major out-of-town retailers, including B&Q and Magnet, with internal and external doors, PVCu doors, windows and fascias, and landscaping products.
Premium uses SAP Business One software for accounting and order processing integrated with a powerful, intelligent Accellos wireless warehouse management system (WMS). The system also has EDI functionality to allow customers to place electronic orders based on live and accurate stock levels. This is a common requirement of suppliers for most big retail organisations.
Premium manages and despatches several thousands of product lines, from its two large 150,000 sq ft warehouses in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire and Weare, Somerset. The WMS is in use at both sites and uses wireless Motorola handheld terminals for accurate order picking with real-time communication of jobs and data capture, as well as a full audit trail for every item in the warehouse. The system uploads data to the back office systems every 30 minutes, with real-time stock levels always visible on the WMS.
“This is a very accurate system that gives full visibility of warehouse stock. If you move something, it is recorded immediately. It is extremely user friendly and new staff learn how to use the system quickly. This is important as warehouse operational staff need to be able to get on with their jobs, without worrying about learning complicated technology,” says Les Harris, IT and Administration Manager.
Balloon One also provides one-stop-shop support for the Premium’s SAP and EDI systems. This is clearly advantageous to Premium as Les Harris and his colleagues deal with one software contractor, instead of managing different IT suppliers.
“Balloon One is very responsive and we are pleased with the partnership. You don’t want to be dealing with different companies for IT support as there are many grey areas. With Balloon One, we deal with people who have a big picture view of how the various software packages are integrated and how they work to support the business,” says Les Harris.
“We have a long working day from 6am until 10pm at night and we know that Balloon One can offer the right level of support we need during those hours. This means we can maintain service excellence at all times to our customers.”
Balloon One
Chris Barnes
Tel: 020 8819 9071
Comments are closed.