We have a very special episode for you this week. We are joined by not one, but two amazing guests.
Delta, which has been in operation for 70 odd years, had up until recently been utilising a tried and tested legacy system to run its Supply Chain. However, in an effort to modernise the company recently underwent a remarkable Digital Transformation. We therefore invited Alexandros Skandalakis and Stathis Makantasis from Delta to shed some light on how they were able to so quickly revolutionise one of the largest Food Companies in Southeast Europe.
On this week's episode Alex, Stathis and Maria discuss:
- Transitioning away from legacy systems to digital
- Quick wins from the transformation
- Feedback from employees
- Data & Predictive Analysis
- Augmented Reality
- Future plans for the company
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:10):
00;00;00;03 - 00;00;26;04
Alex
Being a legendary company that a company in Greece would say, we grew up with that. And this means that, you know, we had the meet and all that. Elements behind it. But also it meant that, you know, the process and assistance grew up with the company itself. It came up to a point where we realized that what brought us here, being successful would be the leaders, if you want in the market, is not what's going to take us to make a successful in the future.
00;00;26;18 - 00;00;44;15
Alex
And that has many parameters like agility, like ways of doing things, like ways of thinking. You know, sometimes we're stuck and saying, look, we have been doing this for ages successfully. Why change it? That's indeed where the secret lies. We need to change and we need to rethink everything we do.
00;00;47;14 - 00;01;19;19
Maria
You're listening to Transform Talk podcast about global supply chain transformation. I'm Maria Villablanca, the co-founder and CEO of Future Insights Network, a fast growing network of over 130,000 supply chain and manufacturing executives worldwide. Now, on the show, I'm going to be interviewing and having conversations with some of the biggest names in supply chain in business, where we're going to be discussing topics around digitization, transformation, leadership, technology, business models, diversity, sustainability and much, much more.
00;01;24;06 - 00;01;52;17
Maria
Welcome back to a very special episode of Transform Talks. This week I'm joined by not one but two amazing guests. Delta Foods is one of the largest food companies in Southeast Europe, and they recently underwent a remarkable digital transformation to its supply chain. So to find out more, I decided to invite Alexandros Skandalakis and Stathis Makantasis from Delta so that they could shed some more light on how they were able to completely modernize the company's legacy supply chain system.
00;01;53;07 - 00;02;08;13
Maria
During our conversation, Alex, Stathis and I were able to discuss the motivation behind the transformation some of the quick wins that were gained and what their employees thought about the changes that were made. Hi everyone. Welcome to Transform Talks. Alexandros and Stathis, thanks for being here.
00;02;08;19 - 00;02;18;27
(00:31):
Alex
Hello, Maria. It's a pleasure to be here with you and thanks a lot for the invite and the chat that we have today, which is going to be wonderful as always. Thank you very much.
00;02;19;21 - 00;02;40;23
Maria
I'm going to jump straight and ask you about the move from legacy to digital for for Delta. And maybe if you can give us an overall view of why you felt it was necessary to move away from some legacy systems. Was it a complete overhaul on your side? What was the plan?
00;02;41;03 - 00;03;08;04
Alex
So this is a legacy company in Greece, 70 years old actually this year. And quite known for its products for the wide range of products, starting from milk products, all the dairy, yogurt, juices, teas and supplying direct to the consumer. And it's an important business. So it starts from picking the milk from the farm itself and taking down to the smallest point of sale around the corner of the neighborhood.
00;03;08;23 - 00;03;36;02
Alex
So it is quite a bit of its end to end business. Just to give you a little bit of some figures behind it. We're talking about, I mean, almost a kilometer long, small to the day, but 46,000 kilometers. So that's a little bit more than around the globe. And that is done on a daily basis. That starts from taking the milk down to actually giving it deliver to the less modern state.
00;03;36;02 - 00;04;00;10
Alex
Being a legendary company that a company in Greece would say we grew up with there, and this means that we have the milk and all that. Elements behind it. But also it meant that the process and assistance grew up with the company itself. It came up to a point where we realized that what brought us here, being successful, being the leaders, if you want in the market, is not what's going to take us.
00;04;00;19 - 00;04;26;12
Alex
(00:52):
We make a successful in the future, and that has many parameters like agility, like ways of doing things, like ways of thinking. Know sometimes we're stuck in saying, look, we have been doing this for ages successfully. Why change it? That's indeed where the secret lies. We need to change and we need to rethink everything we do. That was the first thing, of course, is the that came around is that we needed to learn to unlearn and relearn again.
00;04;26;19 - 00;04;51;02
Alex
And that is something that, you know, it's very difficult when it comes to the time of actually implementing that change itself. The third reason that came is that, of course, we want to find new ways of doing things, not being stuck in that successful but old way of doing things. And that's why Diesel came into the scene and we wanted to change our legacy processes and systems go towards that direction.
00;04;51;27 - 00;05;15;22
Alex
Now what we did is we started with an end to end. You. We said, Look, if you start looking and making knowledge of the commission, we're simply going to crush because the amount of data and we're talking about super fast moving consumer goods coming, you know, fresh meat expires in seven days right now. And so you cannot say out of stock totally the that would give it even in cold storage.
00;05;15;22 - 00;05;35;11
Alex
You know the days are counting. So we had to completely rethink and we wanted an end to end as you now did so for us was not the solution. And, you know, it sounds really strange because you say, look, who told you was the enabler. So we used diesel as a means to go to the diesel. So that's how we started.
00;05;35;15 - 00;06;05;23
Alex
And we started realizing that we need to change. We need we cannot have the old way of doing things. Now our motto was Start small but seem big, but move fast when we start. So we have today to share with you a few if case studies of new opportunity that we touched upon that actually don't work solutions simple with a big impact and actually we chose that if you start picking the low hanging fruits, that's where the benefit is.
00;06;07;02 - 00;06;18;16
Maria
Well, thank you for that for giving us some perspective on the company. And I think from what I can see from my research notes that this is Delta is the largest food company in Southeast Europe, isn't it?
(01:14):
00;06;20;00 - 00;06;36;18
Alex
Yes, it's one, you know, one of the largest and know it's not only the dairy business, but it also has it moving to completely different nutrition elements like no juices of the or plant based. And they are of course, plans to expand further more in the future. So there's quite a lot of things that go into that site.
00;06;37;25 - 00;06;44;19
Alex
Yes, indeed. It's one of the biggest in a leader. Also in many of the categories that the corporate system is.
00;06;44;27 - 00;07;07;29
Maria
Now, I can imagine that when you're proposing kind of all this change to the senior level management in your business or shareholders that they're looking for, what kind of paybacks are we going to get for some of these changes? Right now, a lot of these paybacks might be or the return on investment might not be visible for weeks, sorry, years even, I imagine months, years, etc..
00;07;08;14 - 00;07;16;06
Maria
Did you have any quick wins and you know, any small I mean, small implementation times of short implementation times.
00;07;16;21 - 00;07;45;23
Stathis
Yes, we had some of that. All of our products are where we had the payback period of less than a day of let's say we have developed we have developed a very simple but yet very effective solutions to record real time information on our mail collection, such as logistics routes, quantities, asset quality parameters such as has what blogging about milk, the automated automatic invoicing and many more.
00;07;46;17 - 00;08;31;26
(01:35):
Stathis
So network optimization parameters we improving our ESG indicators such as the kilometers travel pedal, but also improving our collection capacity by 18% one day, reducing our cost by 6%, and tucking in real time info on what the goal will arrive at the factory. Which specific buyer? Because the thing about the product, a little like some of those mentioned of the seven day product says like in the areas of finished goods speaking the distribution centers, we have modular we have modular and I'm very proud of it because we have mostly from our legacy come scanning and the recording system to a very innovative innovative our visual big system speaking and using augmented reality along with a
00;08;31;26 - 00;09;01;24
Stathis
pick by light approach. Both were custom made. So those are actually every case that we're presenting here is a custom made solution, not an out of the box system. And we sat down with the lowest low, the blue color, let's say, employees to do development in close collaboration with local companies. The software the software company that we use for the WAMC, the workplace management system and academia only good.
00;09;01;25 - 00;09;37;12
Stathis
These two projects, the vision picking of the pick by light. We are picking productivity by 7% and signify reduced error picking. Finally, we have implemented the best diplomatic project for all of us on the exit party in order to monitor them, we see the real thing position and the temperature. But if we're going to have real time quantity of information, as I said before, on product quality parameters, operational elements, the routes, door openings, speed, the location and very, very important the metrics.
00;09;38;10 - 00;09;55;12
Stathis
But this of the providers which help us optimize our plan and delivery. By focusing on the network, we deliver close to 3% cost saving in of capacity, close to 10%. And I think and 99% on time and in full deliver it.
00;09;55;13 - 00;09;59;26
Maria
Goodness. I mean, how much stuff did you do? You did so much. This is amazing.
00;10;00;20 - 00;10;22;12
Alex
(01:56):
Yeah. What's that is mentioned that it's a payback. No, we're talking about the day in the summer, you know, the beginning. I was a little bit skeptical of some of the parameters, but we see the implementation. Implementation was done through a local company with customized solutions internally with us. And we actually focused on the small problem but thinking big.
00;10;22;20 - 00;10;43;11
Alex
And actually that was a change. We did not go for a let's take a system from outside, put in place and start from that. But we start and see how can the technology more insight help us? And we started small, but this immediately became with a very big impact. I mean, the frequency with the city, about 6% of the collection capacity and costs of 50%.
00;10;43;11 - 00;11;05;11
Alex
And the cost itself, I mean, that makes sense with all the collection says it's not serious money and the same happens normally and it's not 30% productivity in the picking area only, you know, you start having the big savings have come from there and paybacks come straight on it. It's small things it very efficiently done.
00;11;05;27 - 00;11;27;08
Maria
I like your thinking on this because a lot of times people tend to do moonshot type exercises and so they go in and they replace, for example, their entire ERP system. And it takes years to get any kind of return on that. So by solving small problems and thinking big, you were able to gain quick traction, quick, quick value, right.
00;11;27;16 - 00;11;45;24
Maria
Okay. But I have a question, because you know what I'm going to say next, because we've talked about this before, the failure rate of transformation projects, and a lot of times it's down to people. So a lot of these new features sound like they've improved, you know, added value from a financial perspective. So, okay, the CEO, CFO, investors, you're happy.
00;11;46;00 - 00;11;55;01
Maria
What are your people on the ground? What are your truck drivers think? What are your you know, your people on the ground? What are their feedback on this? You've mentioned the blue collars. What are they thinking?
(02:18):
00;11;55;08 - 00;12;20;06
Alex
Actually, they love it. Yes. From the intake process. They now feel they now fulfill all the necessary forms online on their phone. Because we have developed the like an in-house custom outlet for the collection and completely complete all the paperwork on time without any hassle at the delivery truck. David said that in the beginning a little bit controlled.
00;12;20;20 - 00;12;47;07
Alex
You know, the company knows what I, what I am, what I'm doing. And the specific party, the the third party of some of the third party companies. However, they quickly understood that our focus is ensuring that the customers always get top quality products was key and that the network optimization would help them also to increase the turnover. So once again, yes, they loved it.
00;12;48;19 - 00;13;09;28
Alex
I can I can only imagine that the first day the driver and we started because the driver says, hey, you have opened your door too many times and the temperature has dropped, so you better make sure you close your door. By the way, drive safely. You've been to the closest point of sales and I know that one of them just phoned them.
00;13;09;28 - 00;13;14;06
Alex
They cannot accept the delivery, so please reroute yourself in which they must have half an hour.
00;13;14;18 - 00;13;34;07
Maria
Wow. I mean. Well, it might seem like an intrusive at first, but I think if it is, it helps make their lives a lot better, you know, then that's something that is if you're bringing your teams with you, your people with you, and improving their workload and what they're doing, then clearly that's that's that's something that's going to help improve your chances of success.
00;13;34;07 - 00;13;46;04
(02:39):
Maria
The transformation. I want to ask you a question. Sandra's, which is about let's talk about data and analytics and being able to gain commercial value out of this.
00;13;47;14 - 00;14;11;24
Alex
Has actually benefits in that way. And yes, it has. I can mention one small example. In the past we were collecting to meet so everything that was not on paper before we had all the hundreds of billions and we made we put all the drivers and collected the data at the end, you know, at each collecting point there was a hand paper with collecting information about the quantity of milk, what are the details and all the parameters behind it.
00;14;12;19 - 00;14;50;23
Alex
And the milk was arriving at the factory after, let's say, hours and sudden thinking of being at the factory door. Then, of course, we need to make sure that. Okay, guys, give us a simplistic way. Milk arriving, so we need to get ready. You order for the right necessary process, etc. However, the factory itself that the staff managing the whole approach behind the new system not only it allowed us in the milk collection process, not only the lot with the online tracking of the milk essential quality elements, but also it allowed us to have the visibility of where exactly the milk eats.
00;14;51;12 - 00;15;15;02
Alex
We could say its location on the floor in the in the in the van, which brings in the lorry that brings it here, the specialized container tag that brings it here. And actually, we knew exactly what milk is arriving with quantity, quality and all the details that come with it. Now this the factory and either factories in the whole process knew beforehand what was coming.
00;15;15;02 - 00;15;42;01
Alex
So they had to plan the processes in the right way, in the right approach. So there was a little bit of more advanced, let's say, planning that came to the scene at the same time and said go down to the let's say, to the distribution element. And just to give you a small example, some of our customers demand that we have a record temperature gauge system that we give them to ensure that the products are meeting the right temperature at the time.
00;15;42;14 - 00;16;09;19
Alex
(03:00):
So you can imagine the process of having a gauge before you put it into a record meter. You know, we're looking at the data and, you know, printing and sending it or whatever. So this became actually in the parcels, difficult to do and we're talking about now be supplied to supermarkets. Now when the truck arrives at the perimeter of, let's say half an hour before it reaches the specific location or its kilometers, automatically the system generates.
00;16;09;27 - 00;16;28;14
Alex
But we may not send it to the procurement day and says, look, you guys are going to deliver in half an hour. That's where you lorries. You can see what it is actually. It's going to arrive there and take off 20, 30 minutes. And this is a temperature recording, ensuring the quality is the product that's happened in the last 6 hours.
00;16;29;03 - 00;16;51;22
Alex
So things like that automatically it's helped the end point and this is available to whichever End Point wants to have it, even to the small task around the corner, just to as a proof to ensure that the food is the product that reaches to the end. Customer is on the best quality. Now if you combine all this together, these are elements that help us actually see how we can be the whole plan ahead.
00;16;52;04 - 00;17;15;07
Alex
Another thing is that we get the orders again through we days online. So the whole metric, so the driver that goes around the whole system, he recalls his orders. So we get the orders back centrally. We know in advance what we have to deliver. We know the stock levels, know the production. So it's a lot easier to plan if there is a huge spike or it a big increase before between sets.
00;17;15;20 - 00;17;24;28
Maria
Let me talk to you about augmented reality status, because I understand that you're using that and you're completely bypassing QR codes. Why did you choose to do that and how does it work?
00;17;26;09 - 00;18;02;06
Alex
What the case. What the case? This of as I took it before, I'm very, very, very proud of it. And we have used augmented reality to solve chronic problems of fighting. We wanted to shift all my manual scanning with a traditional RF to vision picking the market solutions that we looked at the and satisfied us. And so we collaborated with the university innocence and the social good provider in order to have a solution that manages to keep the frame rate constant regardless of the distance.
(03:22):
00;18;02;20 - 00;18;48;11
Alex
This was necessary as we wanted the camera to work like the human eye. So in order to be very, very comfortable for the user and such to extend the scanning distance, the result was a globally innovative solution, I must say, because we're the first company that implemented something like that that operators can scan one the barcodes instead of QR that comes kind of throughout as well and some two meters away and were very able to complete the task because it's a combination of vision and the voice speaking as well, so much easier and simpler than before with a significant improvement going on mix and trend of of movement because they have both of their hands
00;18;48;11 - 00;18;48;19
Alex
free.
00;18;48;29 - 00;19;06;06
Maria
Wow. So, I mean, I have to say that jumping from QR codes to augmented reality, I wouldn't have thought it. And so now that you explained the case study, I can see the use for it. I just wish other companies were doing that more often. So. Okay, Alexandros, what do you what do you what do you all go from here?
00;19;06;06 - 00;19;19;09
Maria
I mean, there's there's it's one of the things I like to say is that transformation is not finite, right? Transformation is something that everyone is undergoing on a regular basis. So you're not done here, are you? What? Where do we go? What's what's next for you?
00;19;20;01 - 00;19;55;16
Alex
Absolutely. Yes. And you know, if you were to say that, look, we transformed and we stopped. I mean, that's a full statement. And, you know, it cannot be like that transformation happens all the time because the external environment and the internal and our standards, we also changed time, many more opportunities. So picking up on low hanging fruit, there's a lot of areas that we are looking still more to go into the business itself and there are many other areas within the business that we have opportunities to do a lot more baking, manufacturing, innovating the internal processes.
00;19;55;16 - 00;20;10;15
(03:43):
Alex
There is a standard process, of course, that happens every day to company, but we want to do a little bit more and we get more opportunities that go into the same manner. It's not it's not. And of course, it's a lot of things have come into the scene a lot more immunity than what we do today as well.
00;20;10;22 - 00;20;33;03
Alex
So there's a lot more things due to come. I think the most important one is always, you know, although I'm I mean, I'm a big fan of it's much better to start with small things that people value straight on and then build on it and more opportunities come, more things come following on from that and a lot more can come from that.
00;20;33;04 - 00;20;44;26
Alex
That actually. But the direction spirit, the only way is we need to continue to transform what we do. It's not the strongest of the species that survives, but the one that that that's more to change.
00;20;45;22 - 00;21;05;13
Maria
That's I 100% agree with that. Well, I want to thank you both for being here, Alexandros and Stathis, for sharing this case city that's really innovative. And I and I'm fascinated by the fact that you've been able to do this with all the crisis and everything that's going on in the world and all that, you know, that you've had the vision to invest in this and carry it on.
00;21;05;13 - 00;21;09;23
Maria
And I'm excited to see where you go from here. So thank you so much for being here.
00;21;09;29 - 00;21;27;21
Alex
(04:04):
Thank you, Maria, for writing us. It's always a pleasure to share best practices and experiences that will help others to do it. So thank you very much for letting us especially thank you. Thank you. Was a very, very nice first time.
00;21;27;26 - 00;21;44;24
Maria
Thank you. Now, for those of you listening, will catch you at the next one.
00;00;00;03 - 00;00;26;04
Alex
Being a legendary company that a company in Greece would say, we grew up with that. And this means that, you know, we had the meet and all that. Elements behind it. But also it meant that, you know, the process and assistance grew up with the company itself. It came up to a point where we realized that what brought us here, being successful would be the leaders, if you want in the market, is not what's going to take us to make a successful in the future.
00;00;26;18 - 00;00;44;15
Alex
And that has many parameters like agility, like ways of doing things, like ways of thinking. You know, sometimes we're stuck and saying, look, we have been doing this for ages successfully. Why change it? That's indeed where the secret lies. We need to change and we need to rethink everything we do.
00;00;47;14 - 00;01;19;19
Maria
You're listening to Transform Talk podcast about global supply chain transformation. I'm Maria Villablanca, the co-founder and CEO of Future Insights Network, a fast growing network of over 130,000 supply chain and manufacturing executives worldwide. Now, on the show, I'm going to be interviewing and having conversations with some of the biggest names in supply chain in business, where we're going to be discussing topics around digitization, transformation, leadership, technology, business models, diversity, sustainability and much, much more.
00;01;24;06 - 00;01;52;17
Maria
Welcome back to a very special episode of Transform Talks. This week I'm joined by not one but two amazing guests. Delta Foods is one of the largest food companies in Southeast Europe, and they recently underwent a remarkable digital transformation to its supply chain. So to find out more, I decided to invite Alexandros Skandalakis and Stathis Makantasis from Delta so that they could shed some more light on how they were able to completely modernize the company's legacy supply chain system.
00;01;53;07 - 00;02;08;13
Maria
During our conversation, Alex, Stathis and I were able to discuss the motivation behind the transformation some of the quick wins that were gained and what their employees thought about the changes that were made. Hi everyone. Welcome to Transform Talks. Alexandros and Stathis, thanks for being here.
00;02;08;19 - 00;02;18;27
(00:31):
Alex
Hello, Maria. It's a pleasure to be here with you and thanks a lot for the invite and the chat that we have today, which is going to be wonderful as always. Thank you very much.
00;02;19;21 - 00;02;40;23
Maria
I'm going to jump straight and ask you about the move from legacy to digital for for Delta. And maybe if you can give us an overall view of why you felt it was necessary to move away from some legacy systems. Was it a complete overhaul on your side? What was the plan?
00;02;41;03 - 00;03;08;04
Alex
So this is a legacy company in Greece, 70 years old actually this year. And quite known for its products for the wide range of products, starting from milk products, all the dairy, yogurt, juices, teas and supplying direct to the consumer. And it's an important business. So it starts from picking the milk from the farm itself and taking down to the smallest point of sale around the corner of the neighborhood.
00;03;08;23 - 00;03;36;02
Alex
So it is quite a bit of its end to end business. Just to give you a little bit of some figures behind it. We're talking about, I mean, almost a kilometer long, small to the day, but 46,000 kilometers. So that's a little bit more than around the globe. And that is done on a daily basis. That starts from taking the milk down to actually giving it deliver to the less modern state.
00;03;36;02 - 00;04;00;10
Alex
Being a legendary company that a company in Greece would say we grew up with there, and this means that we have the milk and all that. Elements behind it. But also it meant that the process and assistance grew up with the company itself. It came up to a point where we realized that what brought us here, being successful, being the leaders, if you want in the market, is not what's going to take us.
00;04;00;19 - 00;04;26;12
Alex
(00:52):
We make a successful in the future, and that has many parameters like agility, like ways of doing things, like ways of thinking. Know sometimes we're stuck in saying, look, we have been doing this for ages successfully. Why change it? That's indeed where the secret lies. We need to change and we need to rethink everything we do. That was the first thing, of course, is the that came around is that we needed to learn to unlearn and relearn again.
00;04;26;19 - 00;04;51;02
Alex
And that is something that, you know, it's very difficult when it comes to the time of actually implementing that change itself. The third reason that came is that, of course, we want to find new ways of doing things, not being stuck in that successful but old way of doing things. And that's why Diesel came into the scene and we wanted to change our legacy processes and systems go towards that direction.
00;04;51;27 - 00;05;15;22
Alex
Now what we did is we started with an end to end. You. We said, Look, if you start looking and making knowledge of the commission, we're simply going to crush because the amount of data and we're talking about super fast moving consumer goods coming, you know, fresh meat expires in seven days right now. And so you cannot say out of stock totally the that would give it even in cold storage.
00;05;15;22 - 00;05;35;11
Alex
You know the days are counting. So we had to completely rethink and we wanted an end to end as you now did so for us was not the solution. And, you know, it sounds really strange because you say, look, who told you was the enabler. So we used diesel as a means to go to the diesel. So that's how we started.
00;05;35;15 - 00;06;05;23
Alex
And we started realizing that we need to change. We need we cannot have the old way of doing things. Now our motto was Start small but seem big, but move fast when we start. So we have today to share with you a few if case studies of new opportunity that we touched upon that actually don't work solutions simple with a big impact and actually we chose that if you start picking the low hanging fruits, that's where the benefit is.
00;06;07;02 - 00;06;18;16
Maria
Well, thank you for that for giving us some perspective on the company. And I think from what I can see from my research notes that this is Delta is the largest food company in Southeast Europe, isn't it?
(01:14):
00;06;20;00 - 00;06;36;18
Alex
Yes, it's one, you know, one of the largest and know it's not only the dairy business, but it also has it moving to completely different nutrition elements like no juices of the or plant based. And they are of course, plans to expand further more in the future. So there's quite a lot of things that go into that site.
00;06;37;25 - 00;06;44;19
Alex
Yes, indeed. It's one of the biggest in a leader. Also in many of the categories that the corporate system is.
00;06;44;27 - 00;07;07;29
Maria
Now, I can imagine that when you're proposing kind of all this change to the senior level management in your business or shareholders that they're looking for, what kind of paybacks are we going to get for some of these changes? Right now, a lot of these paybacks might be or the return on investment might not be visible for weeks, sorry, years even, I imagine months, years, etc..
00;07;08;14 - 00;07;16;06
Maria
Did you have any quick wins and you know, any small I mean, small implementation times of short implementation times.
00;07;16;21 - 00;07;45;23
Stathis
Yes, we had some of that. All of our products are where we had the payback period of less than a day of let's say we have developed we have developed a very simple but yet very effective solutions to record real time information on our mail collection, such as logistics routes, quantities, asset quality parameters such as has what blogging about milk, the automated automatic invoicing and many more.
00;07;46;17 - 00;08;31;26
(01:35):
Stathis
So network optimization parameters we improving our ESG indicators such as the kilometers travel pedal, but also improving our collection capacity by 18% one day, reducing our cost by 6%, and tucking in real time info on what the goal will arrive at the factory. Which specific buyer? Because the thing about the product, a little like some of those mentioned of the seven day product says like in the areas of finished goods speaking the distribution centers, we have modular we have modular and I'm very proud of it because we have mostly from our legacy come scanning and the recording system to a very innovative innovative our visual big system speaking and using augmented reality along with a
00;08;31;26 - 00;09;01;24
Stathis
pick by light approach. Both were custom made. So those are actually every case that we're presenting here is a custom made solution, not an out of the box system. And we sat down with the lowest low, the blue color, let's say, employees to do development in close collaboration with local companies. The software the software company that we use for the WAMC, the workplace management system and academia only good.
00;09;01;25 - 00;09;37;12
Stathis
These two projects, the vision picking of the pick by light. We are picking productivity by 7% and signify reduced error picking. Finally, we have implemented the best diplomatic project for all of us on the exit party in order to monitor them, we see the real thing position and the temperature. But if we're going to have real time quantity of information, as I said before, on product quality parameters, operational elements, the routes, door openings, speed, the location and very, very important the metrics.
00;09;38;10 - 00;09;55;12
Stathis
But this of the providers which help us optimize our plan and delivery. By focusing on the network, we deliver close to 3% cost saving in of capacity, close to 10%. And I think and 99% on time and in full deliver it.
00;09;55;13 - 00;09;59;26
Maria
Goodness. I mean, how much stuff did you do? You did so much. This is amazing.
00;10;00;20 - 00;10;22;12
Alex
(01:56):
Yeah. What's that is mentioned that it's a payback. No, we're talking about the day in the summer, you know, the beginning. I was a little bit skeptical of some of the parameters, but we see the implementation. Implementation was done through a local company with customized solutions internally with us. And we actually focused on the small problem but thinking big.
00;10;22;20 - 00;10;43;11
Alex
And actually that was a change. We did not go for a let's take a system from outside, put in place and start from that. But we start and see how can the technology more insight help us? And we started small, but this immediately became with a very big impact. I mean, the frequency with the city, about 6% of the collection capacity and costs of 50%.
00;10;43;11 - 00;11;05;11
Alex
And the cost itself, I mean, that makes sense with all the collection says it's not serious money and the same happens normally and it's not 30% productivity in the picking area only, you know, you start having the big savings have come from there and paybacks come straight on it. It's small things it very efficiently done.
00;11;05;27 - 00;11;27;08
Maria
I like your thinking on this because a lot of times people tend to do moonshot type exercises and so they go in and they replace, for example, their entire ERP system. And it takes years to get any kind of return on that. So by solving small problems and thinking big, you were able to gain quick traction, quick, quick value, right.
00;11;27;16 - 00;11;45;24
Maria
Okay. But I have a question, because you know what I'm going to say next, because we've talked about this before, the failure rate of transformation projects, and a lot of times it's down to people. So a lot of these new features sound like they've improved, you know, added value from a financial perspective. So, okay, the CEO, CFO, investors, you're happy.
00;11;46;00 - 00;11;55;01
Maria
What are your people on the ground? What are your truck drivers think? What are your you know, your people on the ground? What are their feedback on this? You've mentioned the blue collars. What are they thinking?
(02:18):
00;11;55;08 - 00;12;20;06
Alex
Actually, they love it. Yes. From the intake process. They now feel they now fulfill all the necessary forms online on their phone. Because we have developed the like an in-house custom outlet for the collection and completely complete all the paperwork on time without any hassle at the delivery truck. David said that in the beginning a little bit controlled.
00;12;20;20 - 00;12;47;07
Alex
You know, the company knows what I, what I am, what I'm doing. And the specific party, the the third party of some of the third party companies. However, they quickly understood that our focus is ensuring that the customers always get top quality products was key and that the network optimization would help them also to increase the turnover. So once again, yes, they loved it.
00;12;48;19 - 00;13;09;28
Alex
I can I can only imagine that the first day the driver and we started because the driver says, hey, you have opened your door too many times and the temperature has dropped, so you better make sure you close your door. By the way, drive safely. You've been to the closest point of sales and I know that one of them just phoned them.
00;13;09;28 - 00;13;14;06
Alex
They cannot accept the delivery, so please reroute yourself in which they must have half an hour.
00;13;14;18 - 00;13;34;07
Maria
Wow. I mean. Well, it might seem like an intrusive at first, but I think if it is, it helps make their lives a lot better, you know, then that's something that is if you're bringing your teams with you, your people with you, and improving their workload and what they're doing, then clearly that's that's that's something that's going to help improve your chances of success.
00;13;34;07 - 00;13;46;04
(02:39):
Maria
The transformation. I want to ask you a question. Sandra's, which is about let's talk about data and analytics and being able to gain commercial value out of this.
00;13;47;14 - 00;14;11;24
Alex
Has actually benefits in that way. And yes, it has. I can mention one small example. In the past we were collecting to meet so everything that was not on paper before we had all the hundreds of billions and we made we put all the drivers and collected the data at the end, you know, at each collecting point there was a hand paper with collecting information about the quantity of milk, what are the details and all the parameters behind it.
00;14;12;19 - 00;14;50;23
Alex
And the milk was arriving at the factory after, let's say, hours and sudden thinking of being at the factory door. Then, of course, we need to make sure that. Okay, guys, give us a simplistic way. Milk arriving, so we need to get ready. You order for the right necessary process, etc. However, the factory itself that the staff managing the whole approach behind the new system not only it allowed us in the milk collection process, not only the lot with the online tracking of the milk essential quality elements, but also it allowed us to have the visibility of where exactly the milk eats.
00;14;51;12 - 00;15;15;02
Alex
We could say its location on the floor in the in the in the van, which brings in the lorry that brings it here, the specialized container tag that brings it here. And actually, we knew exactly what milk is arriving with quantity, quality and all the details that come with it. Now this the factory and either factories in the whole process knew beforehand what was coming.
00;15;15;02 - 00;15;42;01
Alex
So they had to plan the processes in the right way, in the right approach. So there was a little bit of more advanced, let's say, planning that came to the scene at the same time and said go down to the let's say, to the distribution element. And just to give you a small example, some of our customers demand that we have a record temperature gauge system that we give them to ensure that the products are meeting the right temperature at the time.
00;15;42;14 - 00;16;09;19
Alex
(03:00):
So you can imagine the process of having a gauge before you put it into a record meter. You know, we're looking at the data and, you know, printing and sending it or whatever. So this became actually in the parcels, difficult to do and we're talking about now be supplied to supermarkets. Now when the truck arrives at the perimeter of, let's say half an hour before it reaches the specific location or its kilometers, automatically the system generates.
00;16;09;27 - 00;16;28;14
Alex
But we may not send it to the procurement day and says, look, you guys are going to deliver in half an hour. That's where you lorries. You can see what it is actually. It's going to arrive there and take off 20, 30 minutes. And this is a temperature recording, ensuring the quality is the product that's happened in the last 6 hours.
00;16;29;03 - 00;16;51;22
Alex
So things like that automatically it's helped the end point and this is available to whichever End Point wants to have it, even to the small task around the corner, just to as a proof to ensure that the food is the product that reaches to the end. Customer is on the best quality. Now if you combine all this together, these are elements that help us actually see how we can be the whole plan ahead.
00;16;52;04 - 00;17;15;07
Alex
Another thing is that we get the orders again through we days online. So the whole metric, so the driver that goes around the whole system, he recalls his orders. So we get the orders back centrally. We know in advance what we have to deliver. We know the stock levels, know the production. So it's a lot easier to plan if there is a huge spike or it a big increase before between sets.
00;17;15;20 - 00;17;24;28
Maria
Let me talk to you about augmented reality status, because I understand that you're using that and you're completely bypassing QR codes. Why did you choose to do that and how does it work?
00;17;26;09 - 00;18;02;06
Alex
What the case. What the case? This of as I took it before, I'm very, very, very proud of it. And we have used augmented reality to solve chronic problems of fighting. We wanted to shift all my manual scanning with a traditional RF to vision picking the market solutions that we looked at the and satisfied us. And so we collaborated with the university innocence and the social good provider in order to have a solution that manages to keep the frame rate constant regardless of the distance.
(03:22):
00;18;02;20 - 00;18;48;11
Alex
This was necessary as we wanted the camera to work like the human eye. So in order to be very, very comfortable for the user and such to extend the scanning distance, the result was a globally innovative solution, I must say, because we're the first company that implemented something like that that operators can scan one the barcodes instead of QR that comes kind of throughout as well and some two meters away and were very able to complete the task because it's a combination of vision and the voice speaking as well, so much easier and simpler than before with a significant improvement going on mix and trend of of movement because they have both of their hands
00;18;48;11 - 00;18;48;19
Alex
free.
00;18;48;29 - 00;19;06;06
Maria
Wow. So, I mean, I have to say that jumping from QR codes to augmented reality, I wouldn't have thought it. And so now that you explained the case study, I can see the use for it. I just wish other companies were doing that more often. So. Okay, Alexandros, what do you what do you what do you all go from here?
00;19;06;06 - 00;19;19;09
Maria
I mean, there's there's it's one of the things I like to say is that transformation is not finite, right? Transformation is something that everyone is undergoing on a regular basis. So you're not done here, are you? What? Where do we go? What's what's next for you?
00;19;20;01 - 00;19;55;16
Alex
Absolutely. Yes. And you know, if you were to say that, look, we transformed and we stopped. I mean, that's a full statement. And, you know, it cannot be like that transformation happens all the time because the external environment and the internal and our standards, we also changed time, many more opportunities. So picking up on low hanging fruit, there's a lot of areas that we are looking still more to go into the business itself and there are many other areas within the business that we have opportunities to do a lot more baking, manufacturing, innovating the internal processes.
00;19;55;16 - 00;20;10;15
(03:43):
Alex
There is a standard process, of course, that happens every day to company, but we want to do a little bit more and we get more opportunities that go into the same manner. It's not it's not. And of course, it's a lot of things have come into the scene a lot more immunity than what we do today as well.
00;20;10;22 - 00;20;33;03
Alex
So there's a lot more things due to come. I think the most important one is always, you know, although I'm I mean, I'm a big fan of it's much better to start with small things that people value straight on and then build on it and more opportunities come, more things come following on from that and a lot more can come from that.
00;20;33;04 - 00;20;44;26
Alex
That actually. But the direction spirit, the only way is we need to continue to transform what we do. It's not the strongest of the species that survives, but the one that that that's more to change.
00;20;45;22 - 00;21;05;13
Maria
That's I 100% agree with that. Well, I want to thank you both for being here, Alexandros and Stathis, for sharing this case city that's really innovative. And I and I'm fascinated by the fact that you've been able to do this with all the crisis and everything that's going on in the world and all that, you know, that you've had the vision to invest in this and carry it on.
00;21;05;13 - 00;21;09;23
Maria
And I'm excited to see where you go from here. So thank you so much for being here.
00;21;09;29 - 00;21;27;21
Alex
(04:04):
Thank you, Maria, for writing us. It's always a pleasure to share best practices and experiences that will help others to do it. So thank you very much for letting us especially thank you. Thank you. Was a very, very nice first time.
00;21;27;26 - 00;21;44;24
Maria
Thank you. Now, for those of you listening, will catch you at the next one.
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