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During the Covid lockdowns, and the subsequent drop-off in homeowners taking holidays, TKC – one of the UK’s largest kitchen suppliers, experienced a period of sustained growth with consecutive record sales periods as families spent their savings on new kitchens.
It was clear to the new CFO that the existing systems and processes were creaking, and there was significant risk to the business if improvements were not identified and implemented.
After a beauty parade of prospective partners, TKC’s Andy Helme engaged Chasm to do a full business review, from front-end orders (resellers, e-commerce, trade and direct to public sales) to transport and despatch (own vehicles and various 3PLs).
TKC had grown significantly over the past decade and the business had become considerably more complex, this causing long stressful hours for the management team, not to mention eroding customer service as the supply chain began to buckle. TKC was getting by, but at the cost of hundreds of additional person-hours and the dedication of a core team of experienced managers.
Chasm conducted a full end-to-end system review – encompassing various IT systems, operations and offline fixes and workarounds. Chasm’s strength is its dedication to involving the local team with its process mapping. Involving the users with both the mapping, but also identifying the critical weaknesses and inefficiencies in the operation. We like to flush the drains and find out what is really going on day-to-day.
The review included various methods of order generation in a truly multi-channel business, transmission of the order to the ERP, customer service and engagement, stock allocations, and the full picking and supply chain operation from allocation to delivery (including aftercare, back orders and returns).
Chasm produced a detailed multi-step roadmap for TKC and were delighted to be asked by the board to work alongside the TKC team on delivering these changes.
This roadmap included:
- Detailed system process mapping, by channel and department, with an overlay of potential system upgrades to streamline the operation.
- KPIs to better track process adherence
- A comprehensive list of quick wins/fixes
- Fixing identified supply chain weaknesses
- Removing unnecessary layers of complexity and cost
- Identifying and removing manual workarounds (100s of Excel documents etc.) that should be part of the ERP – or better-connected Excel solutions where the ERP had blind spots.
- Improvements to communications between departments and departmental structure
- Removing an over-reliance on emails
- Better training and simplification of processes to remove the burden on key managers.
Chasm’s involvement was not limited to delivering the initial findings, and the team got involved in several large in-house projects including:
- Relocating manufacturing of cabinet manufacture and a considerable proportion of slow-moving inventory to a new site (helping find and set up the site)
- Working with TKC IT and third-party suppliers on potential ERP upgrades (ultimately deciding to design their own “smart picking” real-time handheld application, which Chasm helped scope and was involved in the initial design and testing)
- Untangling TKC’s complicated back-order and reallocation process (this impacted on service and cost of sales). Chasm helped design and project manage a new back-order process within the existing ERP.
- Working with TKC IT in baking multi-site operations into the existing one-site ERP setup
- Project work in understanding the costs and implications of improved customer offerings. This allowed for the leadership team to make smarter strategic decisions on if, when, and how to implement these added value opportunities.
- Creation of an online payment portal (and telephone backup) for non-e-commerce orders
- A full review of the existing transport planning software and its use
- Opportunity analysis for centralising stock and outsourcing deliveries
Chasm assisted and supported TKC for over a year during its most difficult period of growth and continues to support any system solutions it designed and implemented. Chasm is proud to have supported the TKC leadership team through its growing pains and continues to be pleased to see it ongoing successes.