How vPlan contributes to Washtower ambitious plans
Washtower came up with a simple but world-conquering concept in 2017: never bending over to do laundry again. It was a hit: the modular cabinets quickly grew in popularity. How did founder Co Verburg come up with the idea for Washtower? It all started with one thought:
"Why is that washing machine always on the floor?"
Co wondered about this for years when he was still working in the kitchen industry. When arranging kitchen cabinets, he saw that ovens and other kitchen appliances were always placed at working height. Why not washing machines and dryers? With that issue in mind, Co set to work. Not much later, the first modular cupboard was realised. The starting point: 'Finally having fun doing laundry'.
From challenge to success: Washtower's growth
As the company grew, so did the need for more structure and overview. Washtower's popularity began to take serious shape. André Straatman was hired as General Manager at Washtower: "In the beginning of Washtower, we only had four cabinets in the range. The orders were created in Excel. But within two years, requests exploded: from 50 orders to as many as 1,000 a week! The company then grew rapidly: several new colleagues joined. With the customer service team led by Eveny ten Voorde, new ways were sought to also keep the logistics process under control," says André.
"We desperately needed a plan," - Eveny, Customer Support.
The planning tool that grows with you
Eveny: "Of course we were super happy with that growth, but Excel didn't grow with us. Keeping track of stock, planning, the different sales channels, the logistics sources, the people we needed.... It was no longer possible. It was becoming too much and too cluttered. We desperately needed a plan and that plan was called vPlan."
She continues: "Exact is a good programme for accounting, but at one point we wondered: is this still the right system for Washtower? Excel was not keeping up. Eveny and I had previously become enthusiastic about vPlan, at a previous employer. During a conversation with Exact, vPlan came up again. And so it happened! Together with Michel from vPlan, we rolled everything out. We use vPlan for order planning and now plan all outgoing orders on a daily basis. The programme is just great fun to work with. It gives us a lot of overview and grip."
"We can't do without vPlan anymore".
Washtower's order process
About 80 or 90 per cent of orders come in through the web shop. A quotation is made only for a specific request. The request enters Exact, a few seconds later the order also enters vPlan's backlog. In vPlan, the order becomes a plan ticket, with customer data and order information from Exact. Each ticket is sorted into external transport or internal transport buses by the inside sales department. Internal vans are planned based on distance, location, packages (the number of parcels) and weight.
"vPlan provides overview and grip. The programme is just plain fun."
Eveny: "Once the ticket is scheduled and given the status 'packing note warehouse', vPlan automatically forwards the packing note to the warehouse.
The warehouse can then easily read off the ticket how many parcels they need to pack. Because vPlan has already calculated the total weight of all parcels, the warehouse no longer has to do the calculations itself.If nothing crazy happens, the order can go. But sometimes an order is delayed, for example due to the absence of a driver or when something is out of stock. We can then easily move orders to another day based on available capacity."
Efficient planning with vPlan
At Washtower, they are very happy with the time savings generated by vPlan: "Thanks to vPlan, we can plan deliveries on a single screen. Everything is arranged within 15 minutes. Previously, we had to do this manually. You can clearly see who is going to transport what and when. Moreover, we can now look far ahead, which is a big advantage. What is also nice is that vPlan automatically shifts everything on when there is a change in the planning," Eveny says enthusiastically.
"There is now more insight into who did what, because vPlan logs every action."
She continues, "The logistics department uses the app a lot. There is a phone on every bus. The vPlan app calculates the most efficient route for deliveries. In addition, the drivers use the phone to get orders signed off in vPlan. They upload a photo of the delivery and change the status of a ticket immediately after delivery. Thanks to the link between vPlan and Exact, the two programmes can communicate with each other in real time. Updates on deliveries and packing slips are thus updated automatically. This way, everyone is always and everywhere up to date. A child can do the laundry!" Eveny laughs.
Time savings, efficiency, overview and peace of mind
"Besides being very happy with a visual overview, we save as much as 1 FTE every week," Eveny says. "Orders enter the planning automatically. Hours of manually retyping orders are a thing of the past. Filters are easy to set up so we can quickly see certain information. In Excel, we were sometimes endlessly scrolling. We have made a nice efficiency improvement. We aim to use vPlan even more widely so that we can reduce even more manual work."
Co: "We're going to America!"
Even though at Washtower they have only just got the rush back under control, Co has ambitious plans: namely, he also wants to enter the UK and US markets. Eveny: "You see, we just really need vPlan. If vPlan stopped working tomorrow, we wouldn't know what to do. It simplifies our process so much. We have a grip on what we're doing, can quickly see what's going on. There is a lot of overview. We can't live without it anymore!"
