You can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs.
The EGGER Group has turned this proverb into a sustainable business model, because “wood is too valuable to simply throw away,” as the company’s motto emphasizes. EGGER manufactures raw and coated particleboard and fiberboard—wood-based materials used for furniture, flooring, interior finishing, and structural timber construction. The family-owned company was founded in 1961 in St. Johann in Tirol. Today, it has over 11,000 employees across 21 plants in eleven countries.
The EGGER Group produces over 10 million m³ of wood-based materials annually. This makes the company one of the world’s leading manufacturers. Storing this volume of wood-based materials therefore plays a crucial role. To ensure more efficient processes and make employees’ day-to-day work easier, EGGER relies on the automation and digitization of its processes. When it came time to refine its warehouse processes, EGGER brought the experts from io on board. Together, they took the next steps using the EWM solution introduced in 2014—SAP’s standard solution for managing large warehouses and highly automated logistics processes.
A unified project approach is needed
“The goal was to develop an overall concept that could be applied holistically across all locations: from the complete goods receipt process at each plant—taking into account the various warehouse types, including automation with MFS—to goods issue, that is, the loading of panels onto trains and trucks. Our task was to map the customer-specific requirements and processes within the standard SAP solution. An additional challenge was that EWM was already being used to control material flow without ERP integration, and this had to be integrated into the overall solution.”
First and foremost, a common project approach was needed, within which target processes, work packages, functional and user tests, migration and integration, as well as go-live and subsequent support, could be defined and coordinated. EGGER opted for a hybrid methodology combining elements of waterfall and agile approaches. “We also chose the coaching approach offered by io, which allowed us to be involved as early as the implementation phase and to build up in-house expertise through training and coaching,” summarizes Andreas Sieberer, Head of the SAP Manufacturing Competence Center at EGGER. “The fact that the io team worked alongside an EGGER project team as early as the implementation phase is a unique feature. It is our shared project success,” adds Lederle.
When Software Meets Physics
The io team first programmed a suitable solution for the Unterradlberg site, which was then to be expanded to include EGGER’s other plants. Once the first project was scheduled for 2020, the rollout to EGGER’s new site in Lexington, North Carolina, began in parallel. SAP EWM was put into operation there under the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic—that is, remotely from Germany, without any io experts on site. Together with the key users and the EGGER IT team on site in Lexington, this hurdle was overcome. “At go-live, software meets reality,” Sieberer explains. “Digital tools must work with the physical realities of the warehouse and its employees—right from the start.”
In Unterradlberg, they were still using the old, non-SAP software on Friday. On Sunday, the first stock placements in SAP EWM began—and on Monday, regular operations started. “Whether it’s a physical or remote go-live, as in the case of the U.S. site: crossing the critical threshold in automated warehouses is always a particular challenge,” explains Lederle. “Once the switch is flipped, everything has to work, because going back to the previous solution is extremely time-consuming.” It’s not possible to retroactively track inventory movements in large automated high-bay warehouses in the event of a failure. If data isn’t recorded correctly for even half an hour, it could quickly affect hundreds of inventory movements. “Then it would be total chaos.”
Perfect Order Instead of Perfect Chaos
Instead of perfect chaos, however, everything was in perfect order. The team mastered the mammoth project—proof of a job well done for everyone involved. Building on these initial experiences, additional EGGER locations have been equipped with SAP EWM in recent years. The available functions and standards are continuously expanding—with ever-shorter project lead times. “With SAP EWM, we have a solution in place that is precisely tailored to our specific circumstances and maps our complex warehouse processes,” says Sieberer, delighted with the project’s success.
