Overwhelmed by your WMS choices? (page 2)
-- Logistics Management, 5/1/2005
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3) Technology Environment
Sports Giant isn't unique; all companies must consider both the operational and the technological sides of an implementation. Every selection team, therefore, should include representatives from both operations and IT.
Have your IT people decide what type of technical environment the application should run in, says ESYNC's Sidell. "It may be your current environment or one that you're moving toward.… It's important to spell out some of those requirements."
The future was very much on the minds of Kirkland's team. While the company isn't involved in radio frequency identification (RFID) right now, it was important to Weier's group to know that a WMS vendor would be able to support RFID if the retailer decided to implement it later.
Keeping future needs in mind goes hand in hand with flexibility. When your business changes, will your WMS continue to support your operations? How easy will that transition be?
Site visits and scripted demos are two great ways to get an idea of how flexible a solution is, says Provia's Pulling. "People invariably want to see operations that are exactly like theirs for a reference or a site visit, but you should also look at things that are completely unlike yours to see the flexibility of the system," he says.
Pulling recommends asking the WMS vendor to vary the business process you're testing at a later stage of the evaluation. "Don't necessarily communicate every little thing that you want to see beforehand," he suggests. "That helps demonstrate the solution's ability to adapt."
Buyers should also consider how familiar a WMS provider is with their particular industry. Industry expertise was a factor for Wisconsin-based Sargento Foods when the manufacturer of cheese products decided to replace its WMS, says director of logistics Dennis Roehrborn. RedPrairie eventually won the company's business, in part because of its extensive experience in the food and beverage industry.
"When we would bring an operating requirement to the table, they could relate to it without us having to spend lots of time explaining what we were trying to accomplish," says Roehrborn. "In many instances they had experienced a similar requirement within their client base."
Before entering into a WMS purchase, you should have a good idea of what kind of price tag you're looking at. The cost of basic warehouse management systems has dropped, but they're still not cheap. After adding in all the licenses, hardware, printers, integration, and more, most companies are still looking at a project costing half a million dollars or more, says Tom Kozenski, product marketing leader for RedPrairie. Even for a small operation, the overall price probably will run around $300,000. "You need to understand what you're getting into," he says. "This is not a $50,000 project."
Kirkland's selection team carefully considered the total cost of ownership when it evaluated WMS packages. "What a lot of WMS vendors like to do is, they'll give you a good deal on the initial software and implementation, and it will seem like you're getting away on the cheap. But then you're hit with additional charges if you want to change a process a year from now," says Weier. Continued...
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