The overall success of any retail or food/beverage service organization is highly dependent on the accuracy and efficiency of its supply chain. Getting goods where they need to go, when they need to be there, is a critical factor in maximizing sales.
Some beverage supply chains ship to retail distribution, while others provide product directly to the store shelf for sales, delivery and merchandising. With both types of operations, organizations need to integrate selling, marketing, and delivery efforts across the business. Fortunately for these companies, there have been a number of hardware and software technology introductions that provide “visibility” from the supplier to the store shelf to improve efficiency and the company’s net earnings.
However, despite the proven benefits of many of these technologies, some businesses still find it cumbersome to enter traceability information into their system, resulting in manual workarounds and latency in data capture.
Complicating the matter is the ever-growing variety of beverage types, flavors and sizes that hit the market every year. Beyond the overwhelming number of wines, spirits, and domestic and imported beers that compete for consumer dollars, there is also heated competition between sports drinks, energy drinks, bottled water, coffee and tea drinks, and carbonated beverages. Some supply chains, such as high-end wine and spirits, are well-suited for picking and shipping small quantities. But for companies accustomed to caseand pallet-sized orders of carbonated beverages or best-selling beers, adding new brands and varieties complicates picking by forcing them to accommodate smaller quantity shipments.
With such challenging inventories, it is almost certain that to remain competitive in the beverage industry, companies will need to embrace new technologies along the entire supply chain, to help with everything from forecasting and warehousing to delivery.
Over the years, devices from handhelds to laptops and smartphones to convertible tablets have been used for various tasks along the supply chain. However, the hardware solution best equipped to power this approach is a wireless-enabled tablet PC, which provides all the functionality of these disparate solutions in a single device that delivers reliable, real-time communication and secure data access from any point along the supply chain.
Tablets are lightweight, portable, and easy-to-use devices that deliver long battery life. Additionally, applications designed for tablet use have reduced the need for keyboards, making data entry a simpler process. A variety of tablet sizes and user options are available to meet the requirements of the different job functions across the beverage supply chain.
These devices provide seamless two-way communication between drivers, sales reps, in-store merchandisers and warehouse managers. Suppliers can transmit data that shows what’s been shipped, the contents and the estimated arrival times. Merchandisers can adjust their workflow and personnel scheduling on the fly to accommodate large incoming shipments if needed.
Through the use of advanced mobile software applications, products can be easily traced and inventory precisely managed, enhancing product quality via improved tracking of “freshness dates” and optimizing the flow of product to consumers.
However, even with the demonstrated value of tablet technology, there are still a large number of businesses that haven’t realized the full potential of tablet solutions with a secure wireless data connection, or still have many questions about the best ways of implementing them. On top of that, there are still some businesses relying on traditional pen and paper and manual processes. It shouldn’t be long, though, before these businesses realize that data entry via a tablet can significantly save time and help reduce costly human error. Check-in processing is accelerated, and any problems can be quickly recognized and corrected via real-time wireless connectivity. Not having to look up product codes, visually compare written documents, or manually check invoices or packing slips can help greatly improve productivity.
The Warehouse
Combined with warehouse management systems (WMS), tablets provide beverage distributors increased visibility into their warehouse operations. This greatly reduces the amount of time employees spend figuring out what tasks they need to perform next. Paper-based systems provide total inventory numbers, but can't track the products to individual locations, while with tablets, workers can track every case and pallet of product from the time it arrives on a receiving dock right up until the time it is loaded on a delivery truck. Furthermore, the direct movements of these cases and pallets can be tracked wirelessly in real time, which helps reduce the risk of error.
Linking tablets to existing technologies, such as RFID and barcode scanning, ensures that the right items are being picked, packed and delivered, and shipments can be automatically tracked all along delivery routes, helping minimize the chance for human error. With these wireless processes, businesses have an up-to-date view of their inventory and real-time status updates on orders and deliveries. Additionally, warehouse managers can know where to store each case or pallet of product to ensure the most efficient retrieval. They can then instruct workers on which specific cases or pallets to pull according to the deliveries that need to be made each day.
“Real-time communications for relaying ordering information is critical,” states Mark Maraj, Vice President of Sales and Marketing at MIT Systems, a leading provider of mobile technology solutions for packaged goods distributors. “Businesses can build pallets from orders from real-time input. Without these real-time capabilities, warehouses would struggle, often requiring workers to put in extra hours. This can have a huge impact on a company’s bottom line.”
Furthermore, tablets allow warehouses to further utilize automated warehouse capabilities to keep up on more complex orders and more demanding consumers and retailers. Although warehouse automation in the beverage industry has been around for some time, the easy human-to-automation interface provided by tablets is helping to improve efficiency and reduce costs. Businesses can increase capacity, loading control and accuracy, regardless of SKU complexity.
With the increasing number of beverage options, these improved efficiencies help reduce operational complexity and increase bottom-line dollars. With the wireless communication provided by tablets, pallets can be built in real time, helping reduce the need for overtime hours.
Transportation
For transportation and route delivery, customers expect the highest standards in timeliness, tracking and proof of delivery. When outdated technology or faulty mobile computers contribute to order errors or delays, customers become quickly dissatisfied and loss of business can occur.
Many of the systems offered today to manage the transportation process are proprietary solutions, which are difficult to upgrade or modify as business needs evolve. With the use of tablets, companies can break from these systems and develop solutions that address their specific requirements, using off-the-shelf software.
An efficient transportation management system combined with tablets and a secure, reliable wireless data connection provides better visibility, control over expenses, and more efficient routings for both inbound and outbound shipments.
From helping to maintain vehicles and optimize fuel usage to authenticating deliveries and providing turn-by-turn driver instructions, wirelessly-connected tablet PCs play a vital role in keeping product moving at a fast pace and arriving on destination when needed.
For carriers and shippers, every mile and every nickel counts—especially with high fuel costs and just-in-time delivery schedules. Gone are the days when drivers were left to determine their own routes or rest stops. Today's transportation management solutions allow tight control of these factors as well as the ability to monitor the freight at every phase of delivery.
Savvy route delivery and courier managers are outfitting their teams with rugged, lightweight and feature-rich tablets. The integrated wireless features of these devices allow delivery personnel to access, enter and transmit data securely from their vehicle or the customer's facility in real time. A variety of inputs, ranging from electronic signature capture to image and barcode scanning, are available to support and enhance proof of delivery, time-stamping and traceability. Other driver aids such as built-in GPS capabilities and turn-by-turn instructions also are available. For long-haul drivers, tablets also provide a secure and reliable platform for checking emails, catching up on social media and staying connected with family and friends.
Retail
From pre-sale to in-store merchandising, tablets can be invaluable. All the functions of the order-to-delivery process can be easily integrated with back-end accounting, ERP or warehouse management systems. Additionally, the large screen size of tablets allows detailed diagrams for setting up new in-store displays, as well as allowing the merchandiser to sell new products by leveraging marketing materials that can be shown directly to customers from the device. The increased screen space of today’s tablets also helps improve the efficiency and accuracy of order-taking.
In-store merchandisers can discover and correct problems in the field or respond quickly to competitor activity, protecting sales and their space on the shelf. They can use their tablets to monitor on-shelf inventory and support in-store promotions, as POS displays, and for new product launch activities. Wireless-enabled tablets can also play a vital role in retail stores’ business continuity plans.
With tablets available, if a store’s primary wired connection fails, salespeople can still accept and process payments, securely access customer and transaction data, manage inventory and more, until the connection is restored.
Route Sales
With the number of beverage options available today, having up-to-the-minute information at a route salesperson’s fingertips is crucial. With a tablet, promotional videos and other marketing materials for soon-to-be-released products can be viewed right from the sales floor. Salespeople can also quickly check on pricing and the delivery dates of these new products. Shelf and back-of-store inventory also can be easily managed with a tablet and competitive data can be captured in the retail environment to share with corporate sales and marketing teams.
In some instances, the route salesperson also may be the delivery driver and the in-store merchandiser. When a single person holds all these roles, the tablet is especially valuable due to its portability and capacity to easily switch between job tasks.