SE Asia Online Grocery Leader Adopts Blue Yonder System

To meet the increased demand for its services rising out of the pandemic, Southeast Asia’s leading online grocery company HappyFresh, digitally transformed its operations with Arizona-based Blue Yonder’s warehouse management system.

HappyFresh aims to make shopping more convenient by delivering both ambient and fresh groceries around cities in as little as one hour. The Jakarta-based company operates its own delivery fleet and its staff pick the groceries from micro-fulfillment centers nearby their customers’ delivery addresses. HappyFresh has 544 employees across Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

HappyFresh was looking to accelerate its digital transformation and innovation; proactively adapt to customer preferences, including flexible delivery timing, customized order handling, and real-time responsiveness; and increase focus on social sustainability. The implementation partner on the project was Super Globalindo Viktoria, an eGrocery industry specialist that brings the industry, technical, operational, innovative, and integration strength to the implementation with local team-based resources and industry expertise services.

HappyFresh went live on Blue Yonder’s WMS at its first dark store center in 2021 and has since gone live at its centers in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. HappyFresh will roll out additional dark store centers in 2022, as well as a distribution center to support dark store centers in Indonesia.

With Blue Yonder, HappyFresh has been able to:

• Continuously measure and optimize its picking order lines down to the second, shaving time off the entire order and fulfillment process to ensure it meets the one-hour delivery window.
• Improve order picking productivity for its picking operators by optimizing their workflow to eliminate wasted time and unproductive steps for fast moving products.
• Reduce travel time between tasks by allowing its picking operators to start their next task assignment where their previous task assignment ends, rather than walking back to a starting bench.

“Creating a more productive and efficient order fulfillment strategy has become an increasingly important focus for us, especially with one-hour delivery demands,” said Mesut Keleş, senior vice president Supply Chain, HappyFresh. “In addition, the current labor shortages and hiring challenges have increased the need to improve order lines picking productivity. Blue Yonder WMS allows us to run various picking methods like Single Order Pick and Zone Picking, which helps us to maximize fulfillment speed and productivity to continue to meet our consumers’ changing needs during these challenging times.”

Blue Yonder’s warehouse management system has allowed HappyFresh to manage its warehouse management operations more effectively. This includes better labor scheduling and reporting to maximize employee performance and facility operation, as well as the ability to plan and execute the retail warehouse management process, giving warehouse staff greater visibility into inventory.

“Our WMS has put HappyFresh at an important competitive advantage to expand market share by successfully meeting changing consumer demand,” said Antonio Boccalandro, APAC president, Blue Yonder. “This in turn gives them better buying power with their suppliers, as their larger order volumes lead to better prices. Additionally, improving the picking process for their employees has helped with retaining and attracting the talent they need to grow.”

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