SA Tyre Distributors, the country’s largest passenger tyre wholesaler, has selected leading warehouse management software (WMS) specialist, Cquential Solutions, to provide a solution aimed at moving its warehouse operations in-house while optimising service delivery.
According to Arthur Ledgerwood, head: finance, business development and operations at SA Tyre Distributors, when the company decided to bring its warehouse operations in-house instead of outsourcing, they sought a solution that would position the company to launch new and improved service offerings.
“Cquential’s feature-rich, cloud-based WMS solution and the company’s strategic partnership approach delivered phase one of the solution at our Jet Park warehouse in less than eight weeks, and immediately started delivering business benefits. Offering significantly more than traditional functionality, the system is highly flexible and was ‘tailored’ to meet all of our requirements. The system is integrated with SA Tyre’s accounting system, delivery system and call centre and allows SA Tyre to easily rotate stock, track expiry dates, manage stock levels and reduce shrinkage,” says Ledgerwood.
He adds that with automated and ‘system directed’ picker functionality embedded in the software, all staff on the warehouse floor use mobile handheld scanning devices, eliminating the need for manual and paper-based traditional systems.
According to Cquential CEO, Steve Mallaby, the system is supporting a massive increase in productivity while delivering efficiency, speed and accuracy. “Importantly, this increased efficiency supports SA Tyre’s competitive speedy delivery model. The company is building its competitive edge on its ability to deliver any tyre required by any fitment centres within a remarkably short time frame (as little as 40 minutes from order for fitment centres within an 80km radius of the Johannesburg warehouse, and under two hours for fitment centres within 100km of its Cape Town and Durban warehouses). The Cquential system has cut average picking times from 20 to 40 minutes down to 7 to 13 minutes, which allows the company to make its fast deliveries even faster.”
Mallaby says that what is particularly exciting is that SA Tyre is now positioned as a next generation innovator, poised to enabling the supply chain with innovative new services. “Thanks to the cloud-based digital platform, SA Tyre can build on the solution in future to integrate features such as mobile ordering, CRM and customer alerts.”
Ledgerwood concludes: “We can now leave stock and warehouse management to Cquential and focus on growing our business and delivering world class service.”