Solutions to underpin leading convenience retailer's supply chain re-engineering initiative
Atlanta and London — September 3, 2004 — Co-operative Group (CWS) Ltd, the retail-focused co-operative society more familiarly known as "the Co-op," said today it has selected Manhattan Associates' Integrated Logistics Solution for retail to help automate and improve its supply chain of the future.
The Co-op's selection of Manhattan Associates' Trading Partner Management, Warehouse Management, Slotting Optimization, Labor Management, Billing Management, Transportation Planning and Execution and Performance Management solutions, will provide the organization with the supply chain technologies that will support its future business strategy.
Following an aggressive acquisitions strategy, the food retail business has seen considerable growth in recent years, enabling the Co-op to become the UK's leading convenience retailer with 1,756 stores throughout the UK. At the end of its last financial year it posted a record retail turnover in excess of 3 billion pounds Sterling.
In 2003, the Co-op recognized that to continue this success story and accommodate further growth into the future, it would need to fundamentally change the composition of its existing supply chain infrastructure. The principal drivers in the Co-op's decision to re-engineer its supply chain included a need to improve on-shelf availability and enhance operational effectiveness throughout its source-to-store supply chain network.
"After a thorough review of the technologies available, we identified Manhattan Associates as the company whose integrated solutions would provide the Co-op with a robust set of supply chain tools not just for our immediate but for our long-term future," said Trevor Ashworth, general manager of retail logistics at the Co-operative Group. "We needed an infrastructure that would create a much more efficient inbound, as well as more flexible and store-friendly outbound supply chain operation. The advanced functionality of Manhattan Associates' distribution and transportation solutions, and their ability to help us exploit real-time information on a whole variety of logistics activities within our own organization, as well as exchange this kind of data with our suppliers, will give us more control over just about everything we do."
