Goodlife Foods

At Goodlife Foods, around 4 million snacks roll off the production line every day, ranging from frozen snacks and spring rolls to bread snacks and vegetarian options. Part of the range is private label, but it also includes their own brands such as Beckers, Mexicano’s and Bicky. ‘We mainly deliver from stock to both retailers and catering wholesalers,’ says Cleton. ‘We have two distribution centres in the Benelux and six factories that supply these sites. We also have production facilities in England and Denmark.’

Insight into demand

Goodlife has been using Slimstock software for demand planning and end-product inventory management for several years. ‘Our market relies heavily on promotions. In the past we didn’t have a clear picture of how demand was developing, or what impact seasonal influences had, for example,’ says his colleague Jorg de Jong, who is responsible for Sales & Operations Planning (S&OP) within the company. ‘Since we implemented Slimstock’s solution, we now have that insight and can clearly distinguish between basic demand and demand generated by promotions. This allows us to operate with lower inventory and respond better to demand.’

Demand planning per factory

The individual factories have been drawing up their own production plans. The aim is to meet the demand from the distribution centres, make good use of the production lines and, at the same time, anticipate future seasonal peaks or holiday closures, for example. The latter has proved to be quite a challenge, and it was decided to use Slimstock’s solution for this purpose. De Jong explains: ‘Slimstock’s solution can generate demand planning per factory, taking into account uncertainty in demand and available capacity. By entering periods when factories are temporarily closed, the software automatically calculates the correct stock buffers. The basis for this is the assortment classification of our product range, in which we have set the desired service level for each product category.’

Excess stock reduced from 10% to 1%

Since both the distribution centres and the factories in the Benelux are controlled by Slimstock’s software, service levels have already risen significantly. For A-items, the service level is now 98%, whereas before the company used Slim4, it was between 70% and 80%. Cleton explains: ‘We have better coverage, while overall stock has actually decreased. The percentage of excess stock in the distribution centres has been reduced from 10% to just 1%. I must be honest and say that this is also due to various process improvements we have implemented, but without Slimstock’s support, this would not have been possible.’

Management by exception

According to De Jong, Slimstock provides Goodlife Food with a solid foundation for S&OP, but it is also simply a practical tool for buyers and planners. It enables them to make the right decisions on a daily basis. ‘The system is based on management by exception, so you can respond quickly to urgent issues. During the coronavirus pandemic, for example, this came in handy when, as a result of the lockdown, demand in the hospitality sector first disappeared completely and then began to increase again in sporadic bursts. Planners could see on their dashboard which items required immediate action and were able to quickly analyse how long they could continue with the existing stock.’

Capacity planning

Much has been achieved, but according to supply chain manager Cleton, there is still a lot to be done to get the S&OP process to its highest potential. He sees various opportunities to improve: “In the past, when demand for a group of products increased significantly, for example because a retailer announced that it was going to place an additional order, we sometimes ran into problems and had to disappoint customers. With Slimstock’s solution, we can prevent this by translating the demand plan into the required capacity. This enables us to take the right expansion measures in good time, ultimately allowing us to deliver even greater reliably.”