Fencing in Efficiency: How a Composite Decking and Fence Manufacturer Nailed Inventory Management

This company is a manufacturer of wood-alternative decking, railing, and cladding distributed worldwide. This company also provides products like lighting and outdoor furniture, for a complete outdoor experience. This company’s facilities include 400,000 square feet of manufacturing space and 175,000 square feet of warehouse and assembly space. To learn more about MSC’s BNA, our unbiased process, and data assessment of your indirect supply chain, designed to identify customized solutions to empower performance, generate savings and maximize profit potential, call us at 800.645.7270.

Inventory stock-outs and overstock, disorganized VMI area, multiple vendors, lack of data and reporting, wasted labor time

Conducted an extensive operational site assessment through MSC’s Business Needs Analysis (BNA) to identify opportunities to achieve this customer’s goals for an automated and strategic inventory management solution.

Goals included:

• Inventory management - Streamline inventory to reduce overstock and stock-outs

• Product standardization

• Organize VMI area

• Vendor consolidation

• Provide Reporting and analytics

ControlPoint® Vending, VMI, Cribware, In-Plant, mscdirect.com

• Install point of use vending machines

• Organize, bin, label and manage areas for all through a VMI program

• Install ControlPoint Crib in storeroom to improve movement and transfer of stock

• In-Plant MSC Associate fulltime

• Inventory Control through Min/Max’s for stock-out and overstock prevention

• Unplanned purchases flow through mscdirect.com

• Robust custom automated reporting and analytics to identify trends with real time visibility

Projected Cost savings of $467,000 in the first year

• 5% On hand Inventory Reduction

• 15% Inventory Consumption reduction

• 3% Freight savings on annual spend

• Employee time is freed up to work on higher value work

• Quarterly continuous improvement reviews (CIR) have established a regular cadence of customer communication to formally assess programs in place and to identify new opportunities to optimize their procurement and operations.

• Other areas of focus for the future: Parker Hydraulics Program, Safety Training Programs, Engage MW Specialist for Ap-Op™, TruEdge Resharp and Regrind services.