Hendi Optimises inventory across their multi-site operation

With rapid growth across all of their European branches, the team at Hendi had lost sight of their inventory position. With Slim4, the business regained control of its supply chain to increase service levels from 94% to over 97%. “By intelligently consolidating production orders with suppliers in China, we have also saved a huge amount of money on transport costs,” states James Enti, supply chain manager at Hendi.

As a supplier of non-food products, Hendi Food Service Equipment offers a wide and complete range of products for the professional kitchen including crockery, cutlery, pans, and fryers amongst others. A large part of the range is developed under their own brand and produced in China. To guarantee high quality and to maintain close relationships with suppliers, Hendi has a special purchasing facility in Hong Kong.

“We have enjoyed annual growth of between 10% and 15%; not only in the Netherlands but across all our other European locations,” explains Enti. Hendi has subsidiaries in the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Romania, the United Kingdom and Greece.

“Given that stock is held and purchased by every country, it was becoming increasingly difficult to keep track of what inventory was available where. Consequently, we had to make many internal transfers and we also had a huge amount of overstock. Four years ago, we decided to implement Slim4.”

A tighter grip on seasonal items

Hendi utilises the Distribution Requirements Planning (DRP) function within Slim4 to calculate the optimal stocking levels and order quantities for every branch. Enti explains: “We still utilise intercompany stock transfers but these are now based on strategic decisions. Because we have the right articles available in the right location, the service level has increased from 95% to over 97%. Furthermore, with Slim4, we have a much tighter grip on our inventory; especially on seasonal items such as BBQs and patio heaters.”

Cosolidation in China

In addition to improving its delivery performance, Hendi has also achieved impressive cost savings. “By consolidating production orders from different suppliers to fill containers, we have made major improvements in the way we source from China. This means that the costs to ship orders to Europe have been reduced considerably. We have also rationalised our range with Slim4 and we are actively optimising our approach to product lifecycle management. Product development is a priority for us and Slim4 supports us in forecasting demand for new products.”

Sharing forecasting with suppliers

Happy with the results so far, Enti expects more improvements to be made in the future. “Slim4 has not yet been rolled out to all countries so there are still a few more implementations to come. Our goal is for every location across Hendi to be fully integrated. I also want to start working more with customers in order to gain more insight on events like promotions, for example. This will allow us to further improve our service levels. Furthermore, by sharing our forecasts with suppliers, I hope we can improve their supplier reliability and even reduce lead times.”