Established in 1991, Andari Fashion Inc. is a full-service sweater and knits manufacturer based in El Monte, California. Since its inception, Andari has been supplying “Made in U.S.A.” products to major department stores and high-end designers throughout the U.S. In addition to domestic manufacturing capabilities, Andari has facilities in China, which enable the company to offer its customers an expanded range of products and pricing options.
“We needed to implement a new solution right away and then Softengine called — they really did their due diligence”
— Wei Wang, President Andari Fashion
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According to Andari president Wei Wang, the lack of integration was problematic. “Since all of our departments were operating independently with their own spreadsheet systems, there was no centralized view of where we were in the production cycle. This issue was most noticeable when it came to tracking approvals and deadlines for each customer. Our approach is to keep our customers fully engaged during production, and that methodology involves meeting deadlines for customer approvals at every stage, including fit (multiple times), color and trim (e.g., label placement, zipper, buttons, etc.). If we don’t meet all of our deadlines, then there is a risk of a delay in completing production and that is not acceptable to us. Unfortunately, since we didn’t have a fully integrated manufacturing and production system in place, it was very time-consuming and labor-intensive to get all of our departments in sync so that we could track our production cycles”.
“It was clear that the time had come to implement a robust, flexible and cost-effective ERP system that could be quickly adapted to the way we do business.” Andari and Softengine worked together to formulate an implementation plan and decide what modifications and enhancements were essential. The first step was to install the SAP Business One system to replace their legacy accounting system. Once that was completed, Softengine spent a week onsite conducting a “go-live” training program to ensure that every user in the company was up to speed with the software.
Within a month of going live with SAP Business One, Softengine added its Fashion One module to the system. Fashion One is specially designed for the apparel industry and contains a number of features not found in standard ERP packages.
“With Softengine’s Production System in place, we can now accurately track where we are in the production process on the manufacturing floor,” said Wang. “For example, if we need 1,000 pieces of crewneck sweaters, we can create the cut tickets, scan the barcodes and instantly know the status of the job. Tickets are distributed to employees in each department and after each step, the barcode from that ticket is scanned with the laborer’s initials into the system and that information is automatically sent to the payroll department. The barcode system enables us to drill into employee performance by department; track production orders on a weekly basis and even run a percentage of completion report for each production order.”
From Initial Purchase Order to Finished Goods, Production Processes Run at Peak Efficiency with SAP Business One and Softengine Extensions.
SAP Business One, in tandem with the integrated Softengine Fashion One and Production System extensions, has proved highly beneficial for Wang and his staff. “The implementation alone saved us a lot of money since we didn’t have to spend a fortune performing extensive modifications to an ERP system to make it meet our requirements,” said Wang. “Now that we have everything integrated into one centralized database, we can take advantage of complete tracking of every stage of production from beginning to end. Plus, with most of our processes automated, everything is more efficient, there’s no duplication of effort and we have a global view of where we are with all of our customers.”
Wang also has high praise for the Softengine team that provided all the installation, customization, training and support for the new system. “The people from Softengine have been responsive to our needs and quick to resolve any issues that may arise,” said Wang. “During the implementation process, they took the time to fully understand our business processes and tailor the system to our unique specifications. We look forward to working with them in the future so that we can enhance the system even further and make sure we are optimizing the solution to its fullest potential.”