Ten percent more productivity: nexeye digitalizes warehouse processes with ORBIS Logistics Apps

The good news: In many cases, poorer vision can be corrected with the right eyeglasses and poorer hearing can be corrected with the right hearing aids. This is how good eye care and hearing care improves the well-being and quality of life of the people who need them.

However, eyeglasses and hearing aids are not always affordable for everyone. This is precisely where the optical chain nexeye (formerly Hans Anders Retail Group), which includes the brands Hans Anders, Direkt Optik and eyes + more, comes in. The group of companies defines its core mission in making eyecare and hearing care affordable and easily accessible for everyone.

The optician retailer, which with Hans Anders runs one of the best-known optician brands in the Benelux countries, is therefore aiming precisely at the interests of consumers. It has expanded rapidly in recent years: from 370 to now +725 stores in five countries. nexeye is setting the course for securing its leading position in Western Europe and expanding it further in the future with a holistic digitalization and omnichannel strategy.

„This is an important basis for optimizing our business processes and making them more productive, for noticeably improving the level of service for the individual brands and stores and thus also for customers, and also for permanently reducing paper consumption in line with our sustainability strategy,“ says Sanne Oosterhoff, Group Operations Director at nexeye.

With the Logistics Apps, which integrate seamlessly into the existing SAP warehouse software, data entry in the central warehouse is now dialog- supported and the flow of information is paperless and bookings run automatically, from goods receipt to picking and delivery. The apps currently cover warehouse processes for eyeglass frames and sunglasses from the Hans Anders and Direkt Optik brands, which are managed in SAP ERP (SAP ECC 6.0) with SAP‘s warehouse management system (SAP WM). In these departments, they replace largely manual and paper-based processes, which are therefore not very transparent.

nexeye now benefits greatly from the digital handling of its logistics processes with the ORBIS Logistics Apps. All in all, this results in a ten percent increase in productivity in the warehouse and requires around 15,000 kilometers less paper than before, which ensures greater sustainability and helps to reduce costs.

All this and the fact that inventory accuracy has also improved enormously and the error rate in picking has been reduced to a minimum since the apps have been in use, is clear added value. The 20 end users in the warehouse are also very happy with the modern, easy-to-use Logistics Apps installed on tablets and enjoy working with them.

The implementation of the ORBIS Logistics Apps was handled by Quinso B.V., an SAP partner and member of the ORBIS Group with extensive expertise in the field of SAP warehouse logistics. To make the most of the apps‘ potential, nexeye had redesigned and improved the warehouse processes in the run-up to implementation, including switching to multi-order picking.

Thanks to the trusting cooperation of all parties involved and the use of agile methods with short sprints, the implementation was completed quickly, including all individual adjustments to the business requirements at nexeye. These included, among other things, the optimization of palletizing in goods receipt, zero stock checks during picking or the calculation of the optimal workload when creating picking runs based on configurable parameters such as date, route or customer.

One challenge was setting up pick waves to determine the best possible routes through the warehouse. Here, it was important to keep in mind that pickers must not overtake each other, priorities change throughout the day, and capacities per box can vary. To ensure that end users immediately recognize any changes and are always up to date, the apps were adapted to display deviations in signal colors.

A key factor in the success was involving the future end users in the project to switch from the paper-pencil method to digital workflows and in the decision-making processes right from the start. In addition, they were professionally trained in the use of the new apps. For the future end users, this simplified a lot of things, especially the changeover to a new way of working.

Sanne Oosterhoff is content with what has been achieved so far: „We see the ORBIS Logistics Apps as an important building block on the way to digitalizing and optimizing the logistics processes in the central warehouse and thus becoming a digital and sustainable company.“

And the next steps have already been initiated: For this year, it is planned to successively use the apps for handling the warehouse processes of the other product categories and to introduce them at eyes + more as well.