REXEL Austria, a full-range supplier for electrical retailers and specialist for building automation, sensor technology and automation, relies on an innovative Click & Collect solution from Variocube for its pick-up station. Seamlessly integrated into the company's own ERP & TMS, the Smart Locker system enables 24/7 collection of previously ordered goods. Long goods locker modules were developed especially for this project and secure pallet storage spaces were integrated in order to be able to transfer the majority of the assortment of 220,000 articles smartly. Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
Specialist know-how meets full-range supplier.
With its two leading sales brands Regro and Schäcke and a total of 700 employees, REXEL Austria has stood for customer proximity, first-class service and sound advice for B2B in the wholesale of electrical installation materials and electrical appliances since 1996.
REXEL Austria offers solutions for building automation in new construction or renovation projects. Regro is the leading contact in the group for the topics of sensors, automation and drive technologies as well as building technology and KNX-controlled system solutions. With 220,000 articles, Schäcke is the full-range supplier for the electrical trade and commercial customers and also scores with expert advice.
Customer centricity with innovative Variocube Click & Collect solution.
With 16 locations, the companies and brands of the REXEL Group are always close to the customer and offer first-class service. In order to improve this even further and to make pick-up times even more flexible for customers, it was decided to build a modern pick-up station as a pilot project at the Vienna / Murbangasse location in the course of the renovation work in 2021 and 2022.
In this pick-up station, customers can pick up the items they have ordered at any time, completely independent of opening hours, even at weekends. After the order has been placed, the customer receives an e-mail with the corresponding pick-up code, which can be used to open the access doors to the pick-up area. The person collecting the goods then enters this code at the terminal, the corresponding compartment opens and the goods can be taken out.
After the commissioning in February 2022, they are satisfied: "We have been using the system for two months now and have seen a shift in collection times after hours. We can now also reach and serve customers beyond opening hours through the pick-up station" reports Mr. Mayerhofer. With the installation of the system, REXEL Austria gives the sales staff the opportunity to invest more time in advising customers and shifts the collection of pre-ordered goods almost entirely to the pick-up station. The sales staff and the customers see the solution as an innovative extension to shorten waiting times. In the future, REXEL Austria wants to hand over goods 24/7, independent of opening hours; the resulting optimisation of costs was a welcome side effect, but not the focus for the client.
Why did REXEL Austria choose Variocube?
"The initial contact was in autumn 2019, and we were convinced by numerous factors such as the open interfaces, cascadability, a good price-performance ratio and the high level of user-friendliness", emphasises Mr Mayerhofer "In the course of the project, Variocube always reacted quickly and moved the project forward quickly, which was essential for us, as we were under a lot of time pressure due to the fixed opening date".
Integrated into existing processes with the API.
For REXEL customers, there should be as little change as possible to the usual ordering processes via telephone, e-mail or via webshop; only the option of pick-up from the Locker station was added. Internally, too, orders can be switched from the office to a Locker pick-up at the click of a button. Thanks to the integration into the existing pick-up process, the training effort in logistics and in the office has been low.
Long goods and pallet lockers for special applications
After the customer surveyed the product range and the requirements of the sales team, the design of the system was started. As with the software, the focus was on ease of use for the collector. In addition to the standard modules of the Variocube ProLine, long goods compartments were developed especially for REXEL Austria. These make it possible to store shaped tubes and other long goods up to a length of 300 cm in a compartment that is open at the top. Since the end of the project, the long goods compartments have been available to all customers in the Variocube cabinet module portfolio. In addition, the locks of the secured pallet storage spaces are controlled by means of the central Variocube terminal and opened in the same way as the doors of the ProLine modules. In this way, almost the entire range can be transferred with the Smart Locker system.
Um dies nahtlos zu ermöglichen, wurde eine neue Schnittstelle zum REXEL TMS System (Transport Management System) verwendet, mit dieser Anbindung werden die Aufträge automatisiert an den Locker übergeben und der Status der Bestellung ist für den Kunden im Webshop jederzeit ersichtlich. Im ERP-System wurde eine neue Schnittstelle für Locker-Aufträge in das von REXEL Austria verwendete TMS erstellt und neue Steuerungen und Konfigurationen implementiert. Damit können weitere Smart Locker-Anlagen zukünftig an anderen Standorten einfach aktiviert werden.
"REXEL Austria has consistently defined standards in the electrical industry over the past 25 years, the Locker is now the next fundamental building block to enable 24/7 collection, especially in the greater Vienna area, in an appealing, simple and modern way."
Ing. Roman Mayerhofer / Sales Manager Industry & Facility Management for Vienna, Lower Austria and Burgenland
