THE WEBMETHODS PRODUCT SUITE DRIVES DEAN FOODS’ DEMAND-DRIVEN INITIATIVES
Company Size
1,000+
Region
- America
Country
- United States
Product
- webMethods product suite
Tech Stack
- webMethods Business Process Management (BPM)
- webMethods item canonical
Implementation Scale
- Enterprise-wide Deployment
Impact Metrics
- Cost Savings
- Productivity Improvements
Technology Category
- Application Infrastructure & Middleware - API Integration & Management
- Application Infrastructure & Middleware - Data Exchange & Integration
Applicable Industries
- Food & Beverage
Applicable Functions
- Product Research & Development
- Quality Assurance
Use Cases
- Inventory Management
- Supply Chain Visibility
Services
- Software Design & Engineering Services
- System Integration
About The Customer
Dean Foods is one of the leading food and beverage companies in the USA, and the largest processor and distributor of milk and other dairy products. It is also the nation’s leading manufacturer of soy milk, organic milk and other organic foods. Through its WhiteWave Foods Company, it offers a variety of nationally branded products, such as Silk soy milk, Horizon Organic dairy products, International Delight coffee creamers, LAND O’LAKES creamers and fluid dairy products. Dean Foods operates more than 110 plants in the United States and Spain. Over the years, Dean Foods has grown through acquisitions, resulting in a complex and diverse business structure with multiple independent business units.
The Challenge
Over the years, Dean Foods acquired several new businesses which operate as independent business units. This resulted in inconsistent data across its business units for the same products and a lengthy process to find and validate the data that customers needed. Tracking product formulas for all flavors within business units created inaccuracies and complexity that slowed the item maintenance process. As a result of company acquisitions, Dean Foods acquired a challenging number of new and inconsistent SKUs and UPC codes. There was inconsistent data between business units for the same products and a lengthy process to find and validate the data that customers needed. Dean also needed to simplify and homogenize complex product information. There were multiple levels of descriptions for the same product, and tracking product formulas for all flavors within business units created inaccuracies and complexity that slowed the item maintenance process.
The Solution
Dean Foods decided to leverage the webMethods product suite to create a Master Item Synchronization Process that ensured consistent data use across multiple business units and customers; a process that adhered to industry and customer mandates for information and involved end-users from different functional areas of the business. With the webMethods solution, end-users from different functional areas of the business would be involved in item setup and maintenance activities to validate data accuracy. webMethods Business Process Management (BPM) workflow and portal bring together end-users from different areas of the business to support best practices and ensure visibility and accuracy of item information. No one individual owns the product data but everyone has a part in ensuring consistency and accuracy. Dean Foods employed the use of a webMethods item canonical to describe products used by different business units and customers. Their ability to achieve consistency and accuracy with product information across the company and with customers has been largely driven by their commitment and adoption of a single process leveraging a single item canonical.
Operational Impact
Quantitative Benefit
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