Satisfying the Demand

To increase the speed and effectiveness of its distribution operations, two major snack manufacturers are utilizing two different supply chain solutions. For J&J Snack Foods Corp., maker and distributor of niche snack foods and beverages, including Minute Maid frozen lemonade, a supply chain execution (SCE) tool has improved its distribution productivity and inventory control processes.

Wise Foods, on the other hand, has scrapped its outmoded spreadsheet model in favor of an online, production scheduling system that allows the company to deliver on time to customers.

Goal In Mind
The ultimate goal for J&J Snack Foods is to integrate the flow of goods from production to truck loading. The company has achieved these goals by implementing HighJump's Supply Chain Advantage suite in its Pennsauken and Bellmawr, New Jersey-based facilities, which carry out manufacturing, fulfillment and distribution for the eastern half of the United States. The system has increased automation of key warehouse and distribution processes such as receiving and put-away. At the same time, the company is able to manage complex, inventory control requirements in real time, including detailed lot and batch tracking, expiration date management, and QA hold and release. Intelligent inventory allocation rules allow J&J Snack Foods to allocate products to different customers and channels based on specific inventory requirements. The company can also leverage the HighJump system to kit multiple products into combined, ready-to-sell units and create advance-shipping notices. Finally, the system's flexibility can incorporate retailers' future RFID requirements as needed.

Accurate Improvements
Since implementing Supply Chain Advantage, J&J Snack Foods has seen significant improvements in productivity, as well as inventory and loading accuracy. The solution enables J&J Snack Foods to automate processes around product tracking with tools that track products by lot/batch as they move from production to customer delivery. In the event of a tracking issue, the company will be able to execute it more efficiently and with greater precision.

"Over the past year we've increased the productivity of our operations significantly," says Robert Long, vice president, distribution of J&J Snack Foods. "In the food industry, customers require real-time information and just-in-time shipments, which puts a lot of pressure on the supply chain. With the unique benefits of this system, we are able to meet our customers' expectations and realize bottom-line savings, even in a challenging environment."

A Wise Choice
Wise Foods produces a full line of salty snack products that includes potato chips, corn snacks, tortilla chips, pretzels, popcorn, onion rings, pork rinds and other products. The company holds executive offices in Atlanta, Georgia, operates in 21 eastern states and generates approximately $400 million of annual revenue.

The company recently went live with Factory Scheduler from JRG. The tool offers a reliable schedule of record that allows Wise to reduce finished goods inventory, labor and operational costs and to minimize changeovers.

JRG Factory Scheduler provides a graphical production scheduling system for factories -- enabling on-time product delivery at the lowest cost. The JRG Factory Scheduler takes demand as an input, and balances forecasts or actual orders against available material, labor and capacity. The system makes extensive use of JRG's Adaptive Learning technology wherein the best practices of planners are adopted by the system over time. This 'Build-to-Consumption' model that Wise relies on has become a distinct reality for CPG manufacturers as opposed to the traditional "make-to-stock" model.

Rapid Results
Wise Foods fully implemented JRG Factory Scheduler, including integration to the company's ERP system, on a pre-configured server running on a Linux platform in less than 12 weeks. Benefits from the implementation include:

Immediate usability: With no rules to configure up front, JRG Factory Scheduler produced a useful schedule immediately upon implementation

Reduced finished goods inventory: Wise reduced finished goods by 28 percent within the first two weeks of implementation.Improved service to customers, while spending less money to deliver that service.

Reduced time-to-schedule by hours, thereby reducing labor and operation costs.

"JRG delivered an implementation within weeks and created real usability from the first schedule," says Mike Kopetski, director of logistics, Wise Foods. "Going from manually updating spreadsheets and reviewing a resource book to using a visual, online, easy-to-learn tool has transformed factory planning for us."

Kopetski continues, "two weeks post-implementation, we have reduced finished goods inventory by 28 percent, reduced changeovers by 10 percent across processing and packaging, and have gone from up to 11 hours of schedule development time, down to minutes."