With economic uncertainty causing it to be more careful in buying merchandise, HSN Improvements LLC, a web and catalog retailer of home furnishings, is relying on web-enabled software that supports lean inventory and high fulfillment rates, says Leslie Burke, manager of merchandise information.
Improvements uses a suite of software from Direct Tech Inc. to better coordinate merchandise buying plans with inventory management, which helps it keep the right level and mix of merchandise it needs to fulfill customer orders, Burke says.
“This system is so important to us in the current economy, when we’re not massively overstocked and need the flexibility to plan into the future and adjust merchandise plans on the fly,” she says.
By instantly sharing their overall demand forecasts through a web-based application, which enables personnel in multiple departments to access the same information online, the retailer’s buyers and inventory managers can quickly see what is in stock in the retailer’s inventory management system, and what needs to be ordered. Inventory records can also reveal how quickly particular products from certain suppliers are likely to arrive, and how much the goods cost to ship, to further help in fine-tuning merchandise buys and planned promotions.
With an older system it used before Direct Tech, Improvements could not easily access data for help in planning. “We were doing sales forecasts on spreadsheets that were not immediately available to our inventory control people, so there was a lag in processing orders,” Burke says. “Now, as soon as our buyers enter a merchandise plan into our Direct Tech merchandise planning system, our inventory control people see it. So if we put something into our system today and need it ordered today, it can get processed and ordered the same day.”
That’s made it possible for Improvements' to maintain lean inventory stocks of the right merchandise, while also improving its ability to fulfill customers’ orders. “Our inventory levels now are well within budget every month, and we’re maintaining a high fulfillment rate,” Burke says.
Improvements is a unit of HSN Inc., No. No. 26 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide.
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