AFS Technologies Announces New Demand Forecasting and Replenishment Solution and Establishes Center of Excellence for Buyer Education

AFS REPLENISH Advanced Demand Planning and Replenishment System

With AFS REPLENISH, leverage your inventory as a tool to maximize sales, cash flow and customer service.

Buyer Central User Home Screen	Order Entry Screen

AFS REPLENISH enables companies to service customers at superior levels and still meet inventory levels that minimize cash requirements. Until now, companies have often managed replenishment by making the trade-off between hitting customer service goals and meeting corporate cash and profit needs. AFS REPLENISH improves management of both by enabling companies to service customers at superior levels, while maintaining inventory levels that minimize cash requirements. The cash released from unnecessary inventory investment is critical for driving the strategic growth goals of the organization.

More info on AFS REPLENISH

AFS REPLENISH is a robust solution that until now was only available to the largest of companies. The statistical, historical analysis and complex formulas of our demand forecasting and replenishment software are based on proven techniques and utilized throughout the industry to show tremendous returns for distributors of all sizes.

ADVANCED CAPABILITIES:

Demand Forecasting Self-adjusting formula manages trends at the SKU, item, location, category, and company level, or many others.

Manages seasonal demand forecasting by defining historical patterns in demand and predicting periodic uplifts and downturns.

Anticipates inventory replenishment needs and creates "smarter" replenishment orders that provide optimal customer service with minimal inventory investment.

Performance Management Tools allow management and users to create and analyze “what-if” scenarios and evaluate the effect of changes in inventory policy prior to implementation.

Automatically determines safety stock levels by item and location to meet your desired fill-rate goals.

Automated order generation allows the system to notify you when it's time for replenishment of a vendor line to meet fill-rate and optimize profitability, or set order days to vendor schedules.

Orders built to brackets. Replenishment orders are automatically built to constraints, such as paid-freight minimums or truckloads.

Item and Vendor level economics define the most cost-effective time supply of product to buy at both the item (individual) and vendor (joint) level.

Exception management tools adjust for unusual circumstances or prompt users to review and take action only on items that fall outside acceptable tolerances.

Pattern new item demand forecasts after similar or related items.

AFS REPLENISH was designed with the help of several industry demand forecasting and replenishment experts. These consultants are available to assist with the implementation of our solution and the on-going support of your buyers and management team at your facility or the AFS Center of Excellence for Inventory Management in Marietta, GA. Buyers are also invited to join a “buyer community” and onsite discussion board. Our goal is to assure that AFS REPLENISH is a complete turnkey solution, not just a software package.

Thousands of replenishment professionals, or ‘Investment Buyers’ in Retail and Wholesale Distribution hold the keys to the bottom line profit of their organizations. Buyers require and deserve more than technical training on systems. The solution is a complete Buyer Professional Development Program that prepares the buyer to maximize a company’s return on their inventory investment.

Our consultants help your buyers and management team to:
· Understand the 7 steps for managing inventory as a profit center.
· Learn how to avoid the common pitfalls buyers face each and every day
· Manage inventory to increase customer service, cash flow and profit

The end-to-end approach that we take with AFS REPLENISH helps improve cash flow to get your company out of the bank, into expansion mode or enabled to meet other strategic goals you may have. Improved inventory management in the food industry typically yields 15% inventory reductions and half a percent increases in customer service levels. Apply those numbers to your company, and then ask yourself this…what would I do with that money?

“The goal of this solution is to find the proper balance of inventory to optimize cash flow to fuel acquisition, expansion, market penetration, the introduction of new customer programs and other strategic goals of the organization. Typical results for a $50 million foodservice distributor using this solution are a 15% inventory reduction, a fill-rate improvement of .5% and a first year bottom-line impact of $75,000."