Kimberly-Clark has notched up another industry award for excellence in supply chain management and distribution
June 14, 2011
Kimberly-Clark won the top award for Excellence in Supply Chain Management and Distribution at this year’s Smart Awards for its innovative approach FMCG distribution.
The company is one of the largest manufacturers and distributors of FMCG products, including the Huggies and Kleenex ranges, trucking 35 million cases every year to fulfil more than 120,000 customer orders.
Supply chain solutions provider Dexion worked with Kimberly-Clark to overhaul its distribution network and create a flexible ‘buffer’ between production and final delivery to deliver cost efficiencies for both Kimberly-Clark and its clients.
As a result Kimberly-Clark was able to better connect production lines and capabilities with the fluctuating demands of its national spread of customers.
According to Dexion Executive General Manager ANZ Mark Barraclough, this was achieved by redefining the roles of the Regional Distribution Centres (RDCs).
“A new network was developed to integrate end-to-end processes from production through to customer delivery through two new National Distribution Centres (NDCs) based in South Australia and New South Wales,” Barraclough explains.
Dexion designed and implemented the physical hub of the NDC solution, an Automated Storage and Retrieval System (ASRS) that runs three and four pallets deep all controlled by Dexion’s Real-time Distribution System (RDS).
For Kimberly-Clark, the real benefit of the new distribution network has been switching from a ‘push’ to a ‘pull’ distribution strategy.
“Rather than producing stock and ‘pushing’ pallets around the network to where demand might be, production is now optimised, with customer demand ‘pulling’ stock through the system,” Barraclough says.
“Dexion is very proud to have successfully integrated a complex solution for Kimberly-Clark.
“Our team worked tirelessly to bring about this project on time and on budget. With Kimberly-Clark setting the new gold standard in FMCG distribution it is only fitting that they picked up gold at Smart Awards 2011.”
Kimberly-Clark e-business Supply Chain Manager Mario Carniato adds being recognised by a panel of experts for demonstrating supply chain excellence is just fantastic for everyone involved.