A major supplier to butcheries and supermarket chains in Botswana has found it could reduce costs and increase margins after implementing a SAP Business One enterprise and management resource planning (ERP and MRP) software solution provided by leading SAP Business One ERP business software and technology solutions supplier and implementer, 4most, a Logic Group company.
“We were able to increase operational efficiency without having to increase labour costs,” said Quality Meat Chief Executive Officer Jaco de Villiers. “Another major benefit is increased controls that reduce losses and enable us to have the right stock in the right place at the right time, which is most important as we trade in products with limited shelf-life.”
Based in Gaborone, Quality Meat is a vertically integrated business involving many complexities, such as cattle feeding and slaughter, meat cutting, packing, processing, distribution and the operation of retail outlets. With rapid expansion, the company outgrew its original in-house accounting system and spent considerable time analysing accounting and ERP systems to establish the best replacement.
De Villiers said Logic Group, a specialist adviser on business software solutions, business process management and information technology in the mid-market, was invited to analyse the company's needs and the functional fit of a number of well-established accounting and ERP/MRP software solutions.
“We went through a detailed selection process because we had to ensure that we made the right selection to secure the future of the company. We have good in-house IT experience and knowledge, and elected to go with 4most and a SAP Business One solution that included bill of materials and production.
“What we had before cannot be compared in any way with what we now have. With SAP we are able to tightly run the company. The implementation went smoothly because all of the appropriate staff fully bought into it and we are now able to customise the software application ourselves to suit our special needs.”
Originally a concern was how to handle the high disassembly requirements of the business, but 4most was able to produce an add-on program that works the way Quality Meat wants it to. The program tracks cattle in and out of the feedlots, through the abattoirs and through the processing factory where value is added as well as the distribution of the products to the various sales outlets.
“We know what is happening in our business at all times now,” said De Villiers. “We know what each element costs and business rules have been built into the systems to control workflow and costs. Problems such as workflow, typing, pricing, stock, credit control errors and so on are identified, fixed and do not re-occur. The process of amending the rules took three months but we now have full control and can ensure the rules are followed.”
He added that they quickly learnt to work with SAP Business One and made the system their own, which brought the benefits to the fore. “The system does need a fair amount of maintenance, but not more than one would expect from a system that models the company's business processes. As processes, procedures and master data change, the system must be updated too. Luckily, these actions are relatively simple and can be done in-house,” said De Villiers.
“Management resource planning (MRP) queries have been built into all of the product flow processes and these provide us with information upon which we can make the best decisions on purchasing, production and sales.”
The nature of the business with disassemblies and short shelf lives means 'just-in-time' is an imperative and the company is now saving costs through using the SAP Business One Solution as a means of implementing JIT.
According to De Villiers the key benefits of the solution include being able to totally trust the numbers for costs and gross profit. “Quotations are easy, we're now more competitive, we've reduced out-of-stock situations, grown our customer base significantly and we're not fighting fires all the time like we used to.”
Quality Meat is now starting to integrate its factory scales and control points into the SAP system using the SAP Business One Data Integration API. The greater functionality of SAP has also enabled the company to beef up its HR and internal management functions.
“Our operational efficiency can still be improved and we are working to ensure the software has the right attributes to obtain the best benefits and incrementally grow with the business,” added De Villiers. “We're also working on integrating administrative items such as transport, servicing and renewals, roadworthy tests, vehicle licensing, staff medicals and a host of other issues. The potential for the SAP solution is enormous.”
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