Food wholesaler Fresh Food Village uses Hardis Group’s Reflex WMS warehouse management software in SaaS mode to manage logistics operations at its warehouse, to automate expiration date management, and to gain full traceability of all logistics tasks performed for each product. After rolling out the web version of Reflex in July 2023, the company now has access to transportation management features built into the WMS.
Grenoble, November 8th, 2023 – Reflex (Hardis Group business unit), a leading provider of logistics execution software, announces the latest developments in its partnership with Fresh Food Village, a food wholesaler specializing in the distribution of national and own-brand sweet and savory snack-foods, beverages, and bread products, which has recently rolled out the web version of Reflex at its logistics warehouse.
Fresh Food Village sources, markets, and distributes approximately 200 different products. It operates a 9,000 sq. m logistics platform in Lisses, to the south of Paris. For the past 12 years, the company has used the Reflex WMS warehouse management system to manage incoming goods and storage operations at the site, and to pick and ship orders to customers including supermarkets and hypermarkets, out-of-home catering stores, and snack-food retailers.
Automated expiration-date management and traceability
Fresh Food Village opted for Reflex WMS on account of its user-friendly design and its ability to manage perishable goods (use-by dates and best-before dates) under a first-expired, first-out (FEFO) model, and based on the recipient and per-item date contracts for incoming goods. “Reflex automates the date-checking process, informing our decisions about whether or not to block incoming deliveries or shipments of goods with a shorter shelf-life than those received previously,” said Thierry Marolles, director of the Lisses site.
Reflex WMS also offers full traceability of all logistics operations performed between incoming delivery and shipment, which is especially important in the food distribution sector. “The system tells us which product was received, moved, and picked by which operator, on what day, and at what time,” said Marolles.
Almost no order-picking errors
Reflex WMS is interfaced with the Sage X3 ERP system, which receives orders from Fresh Food Village’s customers and is automatically notified once they have been picked. “We also use Reflex WMS alongside Reflex Voice, a pick-by-voice application,” said Marolles. “As a result, we record almost no order-picking errors.”
A better handle on transportation costs
After rolling out the web version of Reflex WMS in July 2023, Fresh Food Village now has access to transportation management features built into the system, giving the wholesaler a more granular picture of its transportation costs.
From the outset, the company opted to outsource the management of the IT infrastructure hosting the WMS to Hardis Group. The recently deployed SaaS version provides greater scalability, allowing Fresh Food Village to absorb workload peaks.