THE MAJORITY OF WHAT we do is protected by non-disclosure agreements. The following case studies provide an overview of problems we helped solve, without disclosing our customers or violating the trust placed in our care.
Contact us today to discover how K-5 Solutions can help solve your Warehousing, Fulfillment and Operations challenges.
Serialization & LotNumbering
Light manufacturing & fabrication
Special Packaging
Design and Ingenuity provided the perfect solution for one of K-5’s largest customers. A global leader in sleep was stuck with offerings from their current supply chain. What they wanted was an upscale look that met federal flame regulations, and that could be made in custom widths for use in their manufacturing plants. K-5 rolled up our sleeves and went to work.
After several tests to solve the customer challenge, we successfully developed a process to slit, treat, bond and finish this material into a sustainable, safe, and high end component that is still used today. We currently forecast, manufacture, inventory and fulfill this lot-item numbered component to over a dozen facilities throughout North America. This effort required the acquisition of new equipment on our part, innovation & passion by the team, and resulted in a great investment into a super partnership that still thrives today.
A sourcing request that evolved into a long term fulfillment relationship.
Kitting & Assembly
Retail Sales Packaging
Packaging Design & Assembly
A Retail Store nightmare solved
Our parent, Colonial is a supplier of record for a (different) national retail giant; Another brand name you know. Colonial learned that the retailer had decided upon a complicated supply chain for point-of-sale materials; Different items were being made and shipped by various vendors to almost a thousand individual retail store locations. Pulling together multiple vendors to coordinate delivery and then assemble a display at each location proved to be… complicated.
Colonial was informed that the project was not going as planned. Stores were not getting complete kits from the other suppliers, and had to track down numerous suppliers to determine what was missing. It was like them putting together a puzzle without looking at the boxtop picture. This led to an outcry from the retail stores. K-5 was called in by Colonial to help the retailer; The success of the retailer’s investment was in jeopardy. Once we understood the full scope of the project, we sprang into action offering a solution of routing all of the various components into K-5, kitting the components for the display, assembling the final product and shipping complete store packages directly to the stores. The results of our actions were immediately recognized at store level and the integrity of the launch was restored.
Gift Set Assembly
Light Manufacturing & Fabrication
School’s out for Summer
A prestigious Division One University in the South East received a call from its supplier of branded apparel in its campus stores. It seems this premiere global sportswear brand would not be delivering goods promised for a major alumni weekend. University Administration received notification within 2 weeks of the event; Not enough time to find another supplier. The items promised were to be branded with the university’s logo. Goods without the logo would not be bought by alumni coming from every corner of the globe.
K-5 got the call for help from our network of customers. We intervened and found the root cause of the problem. The sportswear brand could then deliver the product, but customize it with the university’s logos. We leveraged our network, in this case our parent company Colonial, to solve the problem. We were able to customize the products, repackage and deliver for the weekend festivities. The university is forever grateful, the alumni had a great weekend and were none the wiser.
Light Manufacturing & Fabrication
Etc.
Tell us what else you need
Solving an issue for a small business that had them pulling their hair out
A local company was asked by a West Coast entrepreneur to create a product with the likeness of politician with a very distinct coif. An item with a narrow market that has a small window of opportunity. Many times, coming up with the idea is much easier than executing it. The prototype was developed, the entrepreneur loved it and the orders were piling up. The last step in the process, affixing the highly recognizable hairdo to the novelty item, was critical. They would not sell without the mane, yet no one could cost-effectively and quickly execute. K-5 was asked to help. Our laser cutter was the solution needed for the final touch along with some creative sewing to complete the likeness. We are still keeping up with demand.
Warehousing
Fulfillment
Inspecting
Packaging
Kitting
&
Assembly
K-5’s parent company got a phone call from a customer who is a retail giant with a challenge. They were importing over 175,000 retail displays for a new launch that would require over 200 containers of display materials. After the cans were on the water they decided that running these items through their DC’s during a peak selling season would be too disruptive. The clock had started on arriving containers, and the customer needed a solution to receiving, kitting and fulfillment that they could trust like own DC’s, but without the disruption.
Knowing the scope of the fulfillment aspect for this job, K-5 worked out the logistics on the fulfillment and developed a plan for receiving, inspecting, warehousing, and packaging for the customer. K-5 was also able to take different elements of over 60 SKU’s and package them together for each of almost 3,500 stores, which required different items. As no two stores were alike. there was a wide range of order variability to get right. K-5’s modular warehousing concept provided the perfect fit, coupled with our order entry and fulfillment capabilities. We delivered the critical retail point-of-sale.
The customer delivered the sales because they were focused on what they do best.
Warehouse Analysis
Process Barcoding
WMS Integration
Warehouse analysis boosts ROI with automation.
We had the opportunity to partner with a small industrial manufacturer in NC to analyze their warehouse, order fulfillment processes and supply chain. This included an evaluation of the distribution center, shipping and receiving, pick-pack and packaging. Our findings identified that the lack of space was an issue in the warehouse and the order fulfillment processes were labor intensive with manual processes.
We were able to purge obsolete inventory which freed up space for all revenue generating SKU’s. We also barcoded the warehouse and order fulfillment processes, automated the interaction of their ERP with manifesting, and adjusted the sizes of the external packaging to ship less air. The ROI on the project is still being validated, but the projections include a reduction in staffing by 4-6 resources in the order fulfillment process. Projections also include cross functional training with other departments for improved staffing usage, succession planning, installation of a warehouse management system (WMS), and reworking the packaging process and data entry for reduced key strokes and errors. In transportation alone, there was an annual savings of over $50,000 based on package size changes alone. K-5 is able to compete in the industry by using solid processes and warehouse solutions. Call K-5 to understand how we can help.