Exchange and DeCA Score a Win with WOW
The Warehouse Ordering Web (WOW) may not mean much to the average associate, but to the Defense Commissary Agency (DeCA) Europe, it means simplified ordering of soda and water from the Germersheim Distribution Center (GeDC).
What is the big deal about WOW? Before WOW went into operation, DeCA Europe ordered soda and Culligan water from GeDC by filling out a form or spreadsheet, scanning it, and emailing it to the GeDC customer service office which would hand key the order in for the commissaries. With WOW, commissaries in Europe can order sodas and water through a simple web-based ordering screen, dramatically decreasing key punch errors and increasing accuracy of orders.
WOW is as a combined effort of the Merchandise Directorate, Business-to-Business (B2B) and Logistics.
WOW has been in use by the Exchange for years and was implemented for a more efficient way to partner with DeCA. The program stalled during the move to GeDC which is when the manual process of sending a spreadsheet and having the DC hand keying began.
Thanks to everyone for the cooperative effort in making this happen
—DeCA European Operations Chief Bob Darden
“We met with DeCA executives this past September in Virginia to find better ways of working together and targeted WOW as the quickest way,” said Sean Shaw, vice president of supply chain optimization.
“We sent logistic/business analysts Marc Hill, Dung Huynh and Silvia Stoudemire to meet with DeCA Europe leadership and gain insight into what we could do to make the process better at the pilot stores,” said Shaw.
DeCA execs asked for a few minor changes to the system, and Project Director David Adams’ IT team accomplished them by the end of October. DeCA Europe was very excited to begin and started pilots with the Vogelweh and Wiesbaden commissaries on Oct. 23, even without the changes in place.
The pilot store’s training went so well, DeCA European Operations Chief Bob Darden agreed to allow the team to conduct training at other commissaries. Hill, who trains and assists all WOW customers, completed training the remaining European commissaries via Adobe Connect. Europe commissaries should be actively ordering in the WOW system by December.
“Thanks to everyone for the cooperative effort in making this happen,” Darden said. “This is a tremendous improvement for everyone. In a word, fabulous!”
GeDC warehouse associate Derrick Kennedy stocks and picks soda ready to ship to Exchanges and commissaries across Europe.
