Case Study: Apparel Retailer 'Escapes The Ordinary' With Advanced Warehouse Management System

Norm Thompson has been known for high quality private label and brand name apparel, footwear and accessories for men and women. Norm Thompson has made it a core business principle to put the customer first and provide products and services that are not only an ‘Escape from the Ordinary,' but also meet stringent quality guidelines in an ecologically responsible manner.

Norm Thompson needed a review of its business processes and systems to sustain growth of 15 to 20% per year and continue top-notch customer service to ensure long-term success. Specifically, they needed the ability to:

• Flexibly manage seasonal fluctuations and order volume spikes during the holidays.
• Leverage new business processes and workflow for higher performance and added scalability, particularly in the receiving and quality areas.
• Optimize resource deployment across the warehouse to minimize costs and improve productivity.
• Ensure vendor compliance
• Easily ramp-up high volumes of seasonal workers with a more intuitive system.

Lastly, prior to implementing a WMS solution, Norm Thompson's receiving flow combined inbound receipt with quality control in a manual, paper-based environment. This created bottlenecks at receiving and delayed visibility of receipts, creating a domino effect of warehouse delays, from the product prep area to outbound delivery.