2014 has been an important year for award-winning company Boughey Distribution Ltd. Through various upgrades, innovations and advances it has consolidated its position in a highly-competitive market, by developing and modernising in some key areas.
Boughey is one of the UK’s leading ambient grocery distribution and storage specialists. From its Cheshire warehousing site, the company provides quality warehouse and distribution services which are capable of shipping to anywhere in the UK. The offering encompasses collection, storage, repacking, picking and delivery. On average, Boughey’s fleet covers an astonishing 10 million miles a year. The business consolidates full loads from its customers – which are food producers and importers – and ships them daily across the UK, to all the major supermarkets, cash-and-carry outlets and food service distribution depots. The company’s geographical location in Wardle in Cheshire means that it is ideally placed to collect product arriving at the Port of Liverpool and to connect with the UK infrastructure at the hub in the North West of England.
Key to Boughey’s operations are precision and speed. Its’ Euro 5 compliant fleet and comprehensive driver training, linked to state-of-the-art logistics planning, ensure that its fleet is streamlined to operate in the most efficient and cost-effective way. This enables Boughey to deliver produce at the lowest possible cost, with ‘Day 1 order, for Day 2 delivery’ available to many outlets. Behind the scenes is important too and Boughey’s warehousing operation covers a total of 900,000sqft with 115,000 pallet spaces and 4,000 pick faces. All sizes of client are catered for, from those needing 10 pallets to those requiring 10,000. In an average week, Boughey process 2,500 orders and delivers consolidated loads to Sainsbury’s, Asda, Morrison’s, Waitrose and all other major retail and cash-and-carry businesses, as well as operating as a Primary Consolidation Centre for Tesco.
Since 2013 and throughout 2014, Boughey has sought to enhance its processes with some exciting, technological innovations. The IT team at Wardle has launched several key Warehouse Management Systems projects in the last 12 months, using both in-house and external skill. This has reduced order processing costs by over 25% and included the installation of a Voice-over-Internet Protocol telephone system. It has absorbed a 117% uplift in business IT support cases, with 85% resolved within 24 hours throughout 2013, and has reduced IT labour costs by 17%. There has also been a stronger focus on infrastructure, to raise warehouse productivity and increase processing speed. This success has partly been facilitated by a new appointment and restructuring within the IT team, which has led to a renewed focus and effort from the team.
The launch of the BougheyNET portal project, which was completed in March 2013 by Boughey – in collaboration with SAP partner Weaveability – has also been very well received by Boughey’s customers. BougheyNET enables customers to access real-time information on their deliveries, allowing instant access to order information, with facilities and features including Order Status Tracker and downloading PODs.
But it’s not just the customers who have acknowledged this IT success. To cap off what has been a prodigious year for Boughey, the IT team has achieved great success at this year’s UK Warehousing Association (UKWA) awards. At the prestigious annual luncheon, Boughey’s team held off some stiff competition to win ‘Team of the Year Award 2014’. The awards’ ceremony took place in July at London’s Dorchester Hotel, as part of UKWA’s annual luncheon. UKWA is the only trade association dedicated to serving the warehousing and logistics sector, so to be recognised at this ceremony is very important for Boughey’s profile in the marketplace. The award was presented to the company that was best able to exhibit an outstanding team effort and work ethic. This combined effort also needed to either demonstrate or promise greater productivity and/or an increase in profitability. The judges looked at the nominations for evidence of bold and inspired leadership, application of best practice principles, tangible results and the positive engagement of team members. Boughey’s IT team was especially gratified to win the award, as the shortlisted field included such prominent industry names as Eddie Stobart Ltd and Potter Logistics.
Keith Forster, Managing Director at Boughey Distribution, has been delighted with his IT team’s success: “Running an automated Warehouse Management System is no mean feat and the IT team has ensured Boughey’s is industry leading. To have the team’s hard work over the last year acknowledged by UKWA is a real honour and makes the months of planning and design worthwhile, even as we strive to further streamline and improve the system”.
With the new processes in place, the IT set-up at Boughey is second to none. However, even with all the success to date, Boughey continues to drive forward innovations to ensure its customers receive the highest standards in warehouse and distribution services.
Boughey Distribution
Martyn Nicholls, Commercial Director
Tel: 01829 262231
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