Sports Image Uses SPS Commerce's Trading Partner Intelligence Service For Superior VMI Replenishment
Sports Image delivers apparel and related items that are branded with local high school team colors, mascots and logos to local or chain grocery retailers. The company manages all inventory management and replenishment functions for its allotted floor space, sending newly designed items to the stores on an as needed basis. Sports Image ships to more than 40 states, with apparel selections designed to suit regional tastes and seasonality differences.
"Based on their extensive merchandising expertise, our inside sales staff is highly skilled in meeting our customers’ unique needs. However, until recently, our staff spent too much time and energy calling stores to gain a true inventory picture," commented Kris Koberg, President and CEO at Sports Image. "To support our growth, Sports Image tried several approaches to gather this information and provide it to our sales department more effectively. All of these approaches were too manual or not scalable. We selected SPS’ Trading Partner Intelligence service last year as it leverages our retailers’ 852 EDI transactions to provide our staff with online reporting and analysis of store-level data. It is exactly what we needed to boost our revenues and those of our retail partners."
SPS Commerce’s Trading Partner Intelligence service gives consumer goods suppliers insight into their supply chain operations by aggregating and analyzing data from multiple sources—including data from retail customers, 3PLs, carriers, sourcing companies, QA firms, carriers, brokers and other trading partners. The Trading Partner Intelligence service for VMI helps business users better identify and understand point of sales (POS) data across customers, products, categories and locations. All reports are offered in a dynamic online environment, leveraging pre-built connections to more than 1,300 retailers. Retailer-specific POS data is already loaded into SPS’ service and no implementation is required.
"Based on a SaaS model, SPS Commerce’s Trading Partner Intelligence service includes the technology and staff to improve the entire VMI process for Sports Image—from contacting retailers to secure their information to integrating retailers’ information into a database to delivering timely and interactive reports," commented Archie Black, president and CEO of SPS Commerce. "Sports Image has discovered that it didn’t need any staff or onsite technology to achieve these goals. By partnering with SPS Commerce, Sports Image receives an easy-to-use solution that fits their business needs."
"SPS Commerce understands the needs of every trading partner in the retail ecosystem," added Koberg. "They are integration experts and smart business people, who understood the needs of Sports Image and created a solution that is the perfect fit for our analysis needs. Our relationship with SPS Commerce is driving more sales of our branded products at current retail customers, attracting new retailers to our business model, and helping the bottom lines of Sports Image and our hundreds of retail partners."
Trading Partner Intelligence is available from SPS Commerce, offering modules to address business needs such as VMI, sell-thru, fulfillment, forecasting and more.
About SPS Commerce
SPS Commerce is a leading provider of on-demand supply chain management solutions, providing integration, collaboration, connectivity, visibility and data analytics to thousands of customers worldwide. We deliver our solutions over the Internet using a Software-as-a-Service model to improve the way suppliers, retailers, distributors and other customers manage and fulfill orders. Our SPSCommerce.net platform features pre-built integrations used by current and new customers alike, spanning 2,700 order management models across 1,300 retailers, grocers and distributors, as well as integrations to over 100 accounting, warehouse management, enterprise resource planning, and packing and shipping applications. More than 35,000 customers across more than 40 countries have used SPSCommerce.net, making it one of the largest trading partner integration centers. SPS Commerce has 35 consecutive quarters of increased revenues and is headquartered in Minneapolis. For additional information, please contact SPS Commerce at 866-245-8100 or visit www.spscommerce.com.
SPS Commerce is a registered trademark of SPS Commerce, Inc. SPSCommerce.net and the SPS Commerce logo are the property of SPS Commerce, Inc. All other names and trademarks are the property of their respective holders.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
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