This Week in IDEA | July 02, 2008

New IDEA and IDEA IRD Customers

IDEA announces three new IDEA customers and nine new IDEA IRD customers. Read more about these companies and how you can begin trading with them electronically to expand your business.

New IDEA Customers

Relectric Supply Company, a distributor from San Jose, CA, became a customer on June 27, 2008. They will depend on Industry Data Warehouse (IDW) for their product and pricing needs and will take advantage of the cost saving features and reliability of Industry Data Exchange (IDX). Established in 2003, Relectric Supply is a private, employee-owned California Corporation which caters to the low and medium voltage electrical distribution and control markets. Relectric Supply has made itself a leader in the electrical distribution and control e-marketplace by providing new and creative ways to source materials. Find out more at www.relectric.com. Welcome aboard!

Besco Electric Supply Company, a distributor from Leesburg, FL, became an IDEA customer on June 26, 2008. They will take advantage of the cost saving features and reliability of Industry Data Exchange (IDX). Family owned and operated for 50 years, Besco’s core business is wholesale electrical supply, serving the contractor, commercial and industrial market of Central Florida. They are a proud member of NAED and IMARK. Find out more at www.bescoelectric.com. Welcome aboard!

Petra Industries, a distributor from Edmond, OK, became an IDEA customer on June 24, 2008. They will take advantage of the cost saving features and reliability of Industry Data Exchange (IDX). Founded in 1985, Petra Industries is one of the nation's top wholesale distributors of consumer electronics, custom installation products, mobile audio/video and appliance connection supplies. Find out more at petra.com. Welcome aboard!

New IDEA IRD Customers

IDEA, a 1SYNC Data Pool On-Board Solution (OBS) partner, implements suppliers that subscribe to the 1SYNC data pool using IDEA's IRD CERICOMX® application. IDEA was recently assigned nine suppliers:

• Professional Sales and Marketing Group, Inc.
• Chocolates a la Carte, Inc.
• B&B Island Distributing LLC
• Fresh Mark, Inc.
• Arcadia Dairy Farms, Inc.
• Better Built Barns, Inc.
• Travelers Club Luggage, Inc.
• Anika Laboratories, Inc.
• Clifford W. Estes Co., Inc.

These companies will be trained to use IRD CERICOMX®, an IDEA branded product for supporting and uploading supplier product information into the GS1 Registry® and GDSN via the 1SYNC Data Pool.

If you would like to find out more about the CERICOMX® product, please contact , IRD Product & Customer Support Manager, at .

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Hubbell, Inc. and Graybar: Sponsors of the IDEA E-Biz Forum 2008!

IDEA would like to thank Hubbell, Inc. for their Silver sponsorship and Graybar for their bronze sponsorship of the IDEA E-Biz Forum 2008.

Hubbell Incorporated is an international manufacturer of quality electrical and electronic products for a broad range of non-residential and residential construction, industrial and utility applications. With 2007 revenues of $2.5 billion, Hubbell Incorporated operates manufacturing facilities in the U.S., Canada, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Italy, Switzerland, Brazil, Australia and the United Kingdom, participates in joint ventures in Taiwan and the People's Republic of China, and maintains sales offices in Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea, the People's Republic of China, Mexico, and the Middle East. The corporate headquarters is located in Orange, CT. Find out more at www.hubbell.com.  

Graybar, a Fortune 500 company, specializes in supply chain management services and is a leading North American distributor of high-quality components, equipment and materials for a number of industries. With more than $5.25 billion in revenue (2007), Graybar employs approximately 8,400 men and women at more than 250 distribution centers throughout the U.S., Canada, and Puerto Rico. As one of North America's largest employee-owned companies, Graybar has the power and stability of a big company coupled with the integrity and drive of a neighborhood business. Established in 1869, Graybar procures, warehouses, and delivers just about any kind of electrical or communications and data product, component, or related service to its customers. Graybar stocks and sells hundreds of thousands of items from thousands of manufacturers. By adding sophisticated logistics and project management to its operations, Graybar has become a vital link in America's supply chain. Find out more at www.graybar.com.  

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Become a Demand Driven Trading Partner

Share Data, Insights and Value

Many companies are attempting to make a fundamental shift in the way they do business by implementing a demand-driven model, coordinating processes and technologies to better understand and more effectively respond to customer expectations. This is noticeably different than traditional business methods as it realistically identifies and responds to customer needs. To become demand driven and consistently fulfill customer expectations, trading partners must collaborate more effectively then ever before to facilitate a real time, profitable response across the supply network. Here are three tangible initiatives that trading partners should do to create operational efficiencies and profitability throughout the supply chain.

1.Establish a solid foundation by synchronizing clean data. Data Synchronization is the foundation for many inter-enterprise activities. Initiatives are designed to gain short term labor efficiencies during item setup and maintenance processes. Longer term payback is achieved through more mature demand driven operations – delivering faster speed to market, increased on-shelf availabilities, lower transportation costs, lower reconciliation expenses, improved customer service and increased sales. While longer term benefits of data synchronization are designed to create a competitive advantage many companies adopt data sync because of mandates or trading partner pressure rather than for the financial gains and process improvements.

The Industry Data Warehouse (IDW) is the best and most efficient way to get business information synchronized. In addition IDEA can complete data match reports and VENN analysis of manufacturer and distributor business data to gauge the level of data synchronization between the trading partners.

2.Become Demand Driven by Sharing Customer Insights. As trading partners become more demand driven, merchandising and marketing functions move from traditional supplier driven events to more collaborative and customer driven promotion strategies. To optimize marketing activities and accurately forecast advertised product demand, trading partners are beginning to work with each other to coordinate the acceptance of vendor deals, promotional product selection and placement in the collateral concurrently. Throughout these customer centric merchandising processes, distributors should share as much purchase/transaction information as possible via Point of Sale (POS) reports (EDI 867).

Suppliers are clamoring for this information and are eager to analyze it. Manufacturers/suppliers should in turn share the results of the POS analysis with their distributor trading partners so they can address any downward trends and collaborate on product mix.

3.Sustain Effective Collaboration by Creating Joint Value. To leverage clean, accurate and granular demand data trading partners should establish collaborative relationships based on joint value creation. The imperative to shape and fulfill customer expectations is driving leaders to figure out the right win-win-win equation (supplier, distributor and customer). A key component is the joint value creation meeting which includes:

a. Top-to-Top meeting – top managers from each company explore how the supply chain can be aligned to improve joint value, like using IDW and IDX. Performance metrics must be established and the business champions (those in charge of fostering ongoing collaboration) from both sides should be included.

b. Open Dialogue Amongst Cross-Functional Teams – To gain the most benefit, the meeting should be comprised of cross-functional people from both partners; those chartered to rethink the relationship for greater value.

c. Focus on True Collaboration – the meetings are sustainable and have the greatest results if the focus is on joint value creation. These relationships need to be created with the view to an outside-in process to redefine value. Benchmark industry practices, improve performance through dialogues by using scorecards, understand industry trends and drivers and better define the desired customer experience.

Benchmark industry practices, improve performance through dialogues by using scorecards, understand industry trends and drivers and better define the desired customer experience.

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IDEA E-Biz Forum Keynote Spotlight on Tim Sanders

Tim Sanders, international bestselling author and former Chief Solutions Officer, Yahoo!, will release his third book, Saving the World at Work, during the IDEA E-Biz Forum ’08. Don’t miss his opening keynote presentation where he will enlighten attendees with essential tips on how to promote innovation at work and give away free copies of his new book.

 

The premise of Sanders’ new book, Saving the World at Work, is that in the new socially conscious day and age, you can make a difference as you make a dollar. Any person, especially you, can change the world by changing the way your company does business. This book outlines the Responsibility Revolution, which is changing the business world. Consumers, talent and investors are gravitating to companies that achieve high levels of social responsibility towards people, communities and the environment. Sanders also shares personal stories on how thousands of people from the mailroom to the boardroom are innovating and helping people, communities and the planet. Topics Include: Sustainability, going green, fair trade. Find out more about Sanders’ new book at www.timsanders.com.

 

Sanders’ keynote presentation at the IDEA E-Biz Forum will have an empowering message: any person, regardless of rank, can help his or her company innovate for good. The key for companies to thrive during this new era of business is to innovate how it does business and achieve high levels of employee participation. Companies leading the revolution include: Google, SAS Institute, Aveda, Patagonia, Interface, General Electric and even Wal-Mart. Come find out how you can promote innovation at work to improve levels of quality throughout your organization - from product quality to social quality.

 

Make sure your company is part of the Responsibility Revolution – Register Now!

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Did You Know? IDW Hot Facts

IDW data fields have been expanded to accept longer descriptions, file names, and URLs. Invoice Descriptions, Catalog Descriptions, Label Descriptions, Kiting Descriptions and other textual items (Keywords, Shipping Restrictions, Ordering Restrictions, Comments and General Policy) have been increased to a maximum of 3072 characters. File names can now be up to 255 characters and URLs up to 480 characters (Ref: PDD Section 6).

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