Bufab chooses Jeeves WMS for efficient inventory management

About Bufab

Bufab is a trading company that offers its customers a full-service solution as Supply Chain Partner for sourcing, quality control and logistics for C-Parts (screws, nuts, etc). Bufab´s Global Parts Productivity™ customer offering aims to improve productivity in the customer´s value chain for C-Parts. Swedish Bufab was founded in 1977 and is an international company with operations in 28 countries with approximately 1,350 employees and the head office is located in Värnamo, Sweden.

- Bufab has been a Jeeves customer since 2016, and Jeeves ERP is currently used by 1000 users on 31 sites in 25 countries. Today we use Jeeves WMS on 5 sites with about 30 users daily and the goal is to roll it out in another 10-15 sites within the group, says Bennet Liranzo, System Manager at Bufab.

Why a new Warehouse Management System?

Bufab saw a need to further develop and streamline inventory management in their manually managed warehouses and looked at several options but fell for the simplicity of Jeeves WMS. Today they, among other things, use the solution for:

• Goods receiving, arrival inspection and goods placement
• Customer order picking and dispatching
• Inventory transfers, stock-takes, ad-hoc counting, and manual transaction

- We realized that many systems became too expensive and complex for us and like most companies we had some unique adjustments that we had to make in our WMS. In the pilot study, it turned out that Jeeves was able to solve this in a good way. We also did not need to build integrations and had a good platform to start from directly via Jeeves ERP. Jeeves WMS gives the user a clear and controlled process, using a modern and simple interface, something that you won't quite achieve otherwise, says Emil Aggefors, Process Leader Warehouse at Bufab.

What should you think about before you initiate a WMS project?

Important when looking for a suitable supplier is that you have done your homework and reviewed your "wants" and "must haves". Focus on which system suits your business. Bring in people from your business who understand the need and who can define your process before you reach out to the system vendors.

- We put together a simple specification of what we wanted to be fulfilled and then talked to several system suppliers of WMS systems, says Emil.

Bufab sees a large increase in  inventory efficiency

A major advantage has been that Bufab has been able to distribute the work in different areas, this is something that they previously did not have. With Jeeves WMS, they can assign different warehouse zones to operators, where they pick their items and hand off at a collection area for consolidation. Here you complete the cover, package, and then send it to the customer.

Another advantage has been real-time information. For example, the operator can see if there is a balance error and then adjust it straight away. The changes that are adjusted are updated immediately and will then be available for everyone else to see.

- We are very pleased with Jeeves WMS and have already seen a better result at the companies that have implemented it. The users are also very positive because they now have a modern system to work in. For our company in England, we chose to implement both Jeeves ERP and Jeeves WMS at the same time. This was a very efficient way of doing it. After the deployment of Jeeves WMS, we see a large increase in the efficiency of their warehouses, says Emil.

Next steps for Bufab and their inventory management

Today Bufab has implemented Jeeves WMS on 5 sites in 5 countries. Due to COVID-19, the roll-out was a bit delayed, but now they are looking ahead and have started up new projects. Bufab sees a great advantage in implementing Jeeves WMS as they get a clearer and more controlled process, they become more efficient and the system makes the work for the staff at the warehouse both better and more interesting.

- We will roll out Jeeves WMS in many of our companies in the coming years, but to get there we also have some developments that need to be made. In parallel with the roll-out, we will develop certain functions to get even better support in Jeeves WMS and our business processes, concludes Emil.