Leading lingerie brand improves business performance and prepares for continued growth with Manhattan supply chain platform
Vanity Fair Brands, the, has improved inventory control, achieved higher distribution centre (DC) productivity and enhanced customer service levels.
The global intimate apparel brand and a subsidiary of Fruit of the Loom revealed it had gained these benefits by deploying three solutions from the SCOPE portfolio, including warehouse management, slotting optimisation and supply chain intelligence from software provider Manhattan Associates, at its 100,000-square-foot DC in Barcelona, Spain.
Vanity Fair Brands, which trades under the exclusive lingerie brands Vanity Fair, Gemma, Belcor, Intima Cherry, Lou, Bestform and Variance, serves customers across Europe from its Barcelona offices and DC. The company’s European operations faced several distribution challenges: the development of new commercial channels, changing customer requirements, and a supply model focused on higher volumes of product manufactured in the Far East. These challenges required an upgrade in Vanity Fair Brands’ distribution operations, logistics infrastructure and information systems.
Fernando Camps, chief financial officer at Vanity Fair Brands Europe, commented: “When we started to look at upgrading our European logistical processes and infrastructure, the need for replacing the warehouse management system quickly became evident. Our legacy system simply could not cope with the changes the business was facing without additional programming. It became apparent that an upgrade needed to go beyond the warehouse environment and include the coordination of logistics processes with our suppliers in Asia. Our goals were to enhance visibility of stock, automate warehouse processes, handle increasing product volumes, and manage inventory in a more efficient manner.”
Logistics process reengineering
After conducting a thorough review of the market, Vanity Fair Brands selected Manhattan Associates and its regional ‘GeoPartner’, Supply Nexus, a specialised consultancy focusing on the Spanish and Portuguese markets, which provides sales, implementation and post-sales support for Manhattan solutions in the Iberian Peninsula.
The new supply chain technology platform has also facilitated the use of multi-order picking, supported by Vocollect voice terminals. The combined Manhattan and voice system increased productivity among staff involved in the order fulfilment process by reducing travel time between picks and by enabling between four and 24 orders to be prepared simultaneously.
Vanity Fair Brands has also benefitted from tighter inventory control, improved levels of customer service, and a more satisfied workforce within the warehouse. Moreover, all deadlines were met and the project stayed within the proposed budget.
“Our first Christmas campaign with the Manhattan technology was a real test for the new solutions,” explained Camps. “The season went very smoothly, and we were highly impressed with how quickly we were able to implement the new Manhattan Associates solutions and with some of the efficiency improvements we’ve already seen. The excellent results we have achieved so far makes them a strong candidate to provide us with future solutions as we seek to continue improving the way we run our supply chain and serve our customers.”
