The Ask:
UK-based bespoke urban furniture manufacturer – Woodscape, approached Explic8 for guidance and expertise on the implementation of the Material Resource Planning software (MRP) MRPeasy, as their current system was under utilised, resulting in the company remaining heavily reliant on complex spreadsheets requiring manual intervention to conduct their production planning and inventory control.
Results and Benefits
- Centralised cloud-based software allowing access to production planning, inventory and procurement management
- Visibility of manufacturing costs and customer order profits to enable enhanced strategic planning capabilities
- Multiple complex planning documents made redundant
- Increase in accuracy of stock control through implementation of shopfloor reporting at the point of usage
- Visualisation of production planning and Gantt chart of manufacturing operations
Challenges:
- Over 70% of products were categorised as highly customised versions from a standard product catalogue or bespoke products based on customer specifications
- Development of production planning data with the creation of bill of materials, routings and standard operating procedures
- The incorporation of timber inventory control and processing requires satisfying regulatory requirements set by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)
- Business process development required the MRPeasy software to be utilised by 40 employees and multiple business functions
Implications
- Continued reliance on offline production planning documents would require investment in hardware infrastructure.
- High levels of manual intervention required to ensure inventory levels were updated and managed.
- Complex planning documents could not be accessed simultaneously.
Objectives
- Implement the cloud-based MRP system MRPeasy with shopfloor reporting and capacity capabilities.
- Develop the methodology to deliver accurate production planning information requirements for products.
- Increase the information available to Woodscape to allow for analysis of production costs through material and labour, capacity, profitability and inventory usage.
The Approach:
- 4 month project centred around consulting, analysing and developing processes to match system capabilities.
- Analysis conducted into company processes to identify opportunities for improvement and to implement control and stability before the implementation of MRPeasy.
- Mentoring internal problem-solving to develop solutions allowing for the successful implementation of the MRP software.
- Strengthening interdepartmental relationships to share information and brainstorm solutions to challenges faced.
