SDI Group is a global business providing both Flat and Hanging Solutions to the worlds leading fashion retailers for the high street and ecommerce. Solutions include high speed sortation, ASRS, Conveyor systems and a whole range of Hanging Garment single unit transport systems and sortation.
WLN – 2012: how was it for you?
2012 was a very busy year for the group with large projects in Brazil, Holland, France and North America. Rising costs have meant an increasing trend amongst existing customers to sweat existing assets and this has resulted in a lot of innovative solutions to improve efficiency and gain more volume throughput while keeping existing operations running.
WLN – Did your company provide any of the warehousing and logistics services for any of the major public events this year? Have you noticed any lasting effect after these events?
Yes we had a presence at four shows this year across Europe and saw considerable enquiries from customers who wanted more choice than their existing vendor base.
WLN – What effect did the major snow falls at the end of last year, the lack of summer, and the Olympic Games have on your company?
No real impact as we work across the Globe and we saw upswings in other locations.
WLN – What is your particular proposition for customers in the warehouse & logistics sector? Has that changed since last year?
To be a one stop shop for all services to the fashion sector of logistics and provide a flexible response to their dynamic market place. Yes we are seeing an increasing trend towards solutions for ecommerce where we have developed a new range of solutions.
WLN – How has your business sector been performing in 2012? What do you see as the most important recent developments?
Despite the economy we see the dominant players in fashion continuing to spend money where they can guarantee cost savings in physical distribution and improve availability to the consumer.
WLN – Have you moved into any new areas of activity during 2012? How are they doing?
Our focus remains to continue to improve and develop our solutions for the apparel sector. Our newly developed flexible sorting unit for flat sortation has achieved everything we wanted from it and we have been very pleased with customer feedback which sees it as a world leading product.
WLN – What was your biggest investment to improve your business in 2012? What else did you do?
Our largest investment this year was the development of fulfillment solutions for Apparel where we have invested over £1M in new developments in this sector.
WLN – How are your existing products and services doing?
We are very pleased with our current product range and how it stacks up against competitor products in the market place. We also feel our response times and general installation speeds have continued to be world class and benefiting our customers who are needing extremely quick response times.
WLN – Have you launched any new products or services in 2012? What are they, and how are they performing?
Our flexible sorting unit which is a high speed apparel flat product sorter which as discussed is achieving above budget orders.
WLN – What’s been your company’s single biggest achievement in business this year?
Completing a new European Distribution centre for TNT to support their customer Abercrombie and Fitch in a very demanding timescale.
WLN – If you had to go through 2012 again, what would you do differently?
Work harder on understanding our customer changing strategies in efullfillment and fast fashion to support them in the next five years.
WLN – Do you operate in any other countries besides the UK? How are you getting on there? Have you gone into any new countries in 2012? What’s that been like?
We have offices in France, Germany, Holland, Poland, Italy, Turkey and Spain. All markets are strong this year.
WLN – Which industry sectors are your customers in?
Apparel fashion.
WLN – What applications do people use your products for? Have you seen a shift in industry sector demand during this time?
As discussed an upturn.
WLN – Do you sell your products direct or through distributors? Has that strategy changed in the last year?
We only sell direct.
WLN – How do your forward orders compare with last year?
Our forward orders are 20% ahead of budget.
WLN – How do your lead times on orders compare with a year ago?
Lead times are decreasing from the customers but manufacturing lead times are increasing due to current backlogs.
WLN – Can you tell us about your plans for 2013? Where do you see your company going next year?
We are continuing to build on a great 2012, and develop our presence further in Germany which has become a key market for us in the last three years. We also hope to increase our staff levels and continue to develop our geographical presence in three new countries globally.
SDI Group
Tel: 01763 244299
email: sales@sdigroup.com
twitter.com/SDIGroupLtd
Comments are closed.