As a major steel and industrial supplier, Joseph Fazzio operates a 28-acre site offering a massive 26,000-ton inventory of new prime and excess steel, metals, and industrial items. Contractors from miles around buy their heavy duty industrial supplies, get a receipt and drive their trucks around back to pick up their purchase from inventory.
All large stocked items that require mechanical loading into a vehicle are in an employee-controlled section of the warehouse. Buyers can purchase everything from forklifts to welding supplies to steel beams to huge 5 foot long bolts.
Customer purchases of larger warehouse items were hindered by the purchasing process. The front desk would have to first confirm inventory on large stock items prior to a purchase.
This means the salesperson would use a walkie talkie or phone to discuss pending purchase items with warehouse staff. In a time consuming pursuit, warehouse staff would then traverse the grounds to try and find the various items to confirm stock before a sale could be rung.
After working to understand Joesph Fazzio's business processes, the favored solution was to give the front desk access to inventory via a new Web interface and to give warehouse staff a phone app, that works both for Android and iOS, to quickly look up where an item is located and to be able to deduct what is taken to keep inventory up to date.
✔ Customers happily get their purchases faster with less wait time.
✔ Front desk employees can service more customers because there is less time awaiting confirmation on stock prior to ringing a purchase.
✔ Warehouse employees walking the grounds no longer waste time searching for where hundreds of items are located.
✔ Joseph Fazzio has more accurate inventory stock records enabling them to trust what is selling best, track trends and know when to replenish supplies.
