Evergreen Garden Care

Evergreen
Client Success Story

Industry/ sector:

Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG)

Consultant name:

Kapil/Prashant/ Shivanesh

Customer name:

Evergreen Garden Care

Location:

UK/NL/BE/FR

Website of the customer:

https://www.lovethegarden.com/

Software solution implemented:

SAP IBP Demand Planning

Project start date:

01-04-2023

Project end date:

04-11-2023

Client Business

Evergreen Garden Care is the leading garden care company, producing high quality garden care products designed to help people create their own green oasis amid the rush of daily life.

Evergreen Garden Care was formed in 2017 through the acquisition of the international activities of Scott’s Miracle-Gro Company. The organization consists of a passionate team of around 800 employees who ensure that gardeners, with or without experience, can easily grow and protect their lawn, plants, fruit or vegetables and thus make their own green oasis as beautiful as possible.

With leading brands such as Miracle-Gro, Fertiligène, Substral or Pokon, it is possible to offer gardeners a full range of garden care products in all markets in the United Kingdom, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Poland, the Scandinavian countries, Australia and New Zealand.

Challenges

Evergreen was managing very seasonal business demand with manual planning processes that were very iterative and time consuming. The customer had to deal with complexities of constrained warehouse and production capacity, and raw materials constraints. This situation was making it impossible for the business to break the cycle of reactive demand and supply adjustments, resulting in regular production capacity problems and too much inventory.

Further complicating their operational efficiency was the management of seven global sales offices. These offices operated in silos, each generating its own sales forecasts and demand plans for shared suppliers—including both in-house and outsourced—without any coordinated consensus. This approach was implemented at various times and through multiple iterations, which significantly diminished the accuracy of their forecasting and, by extension, their overall supply chain effectiveness.

BCG Solution

The project was strategically segmented into three core components: Master Data, Demand Planning, and Supply Planning. Initially, we prioritized the establishment of robust Master Data governance by defining stringent data rules, defining clear roles and responsibilities, and implementing SAP IBP’s Add-On features to enhance data quality. We shifted the creation of Master Data to S/4HANA to ensure consistency and integrity, utilizing it as the primary data source. Upon successfully setting up the Master Data foundation, we transitioned to the Demand Planning phase, where we introduced ABC/XYZ segmentation and sophisticated statistical forecasting models to generate the forecast baseline forecast and also provide the possibility to incorporate inputs from Sales and Marketing to come to Consensus Demand. To monitor the forecasting outcomes, we designed and implemented bespoke dashboards that not only tracked key performance indicators but also generated alerts for proactive exception management.

Methodology Followed

The project commenced with the collection of user requirements involving Business Process Owners, Experts, and Key Users. Once gathered, these requirements informed the system design, detailed in the ‘Business Blueprint’ document, which received formal approval before system development began.

Adhering to Agile principles, the system was developed and documented in the ‘As Build’ document. Subsequent to the build phase, demonstrations were held for stakeholders.

The testing phase involved both Unit Testing and System Integration Testing by offshore consultants to address technical issues before the preparation phase.

In the preparation phase, Business Process Experts and Key Users were trained and engaged in User Acceptance Testing using predefined test scripts based on the Business Process Excellence Framework. This phase also included training of end users by Key Users.

The go-live phase involved transferring the tested system to the production environment, timed over a weekend to ensure a smooth start.

Post-launch, the project was supported with two weeks of Hypercare and four weeks of Aftercare. Finally, ongoing operational support for Business As Usual (BAU) issues was provided by an offshore team as outlined in the service contract.

Benefits

The SAP IBP implementation at Evergreen showcase the power of digital transformation in the supply chain. By leveraging the advanced capabilities of SAP IBP, Evergreen has not only overcome its initial challenges but has also set a new standard for supply chain excellence. Our team is proud to have partnered with Evergreen on this journey, showcasing our expertise in delivering cutting-edge supply chain solutions that drive real business results.

Some of the KPIs measured as part of the project:

Training Effectiveness KPI: 4.2 out of 5 stars

User Adoption Rate KPI: 4.1 out of 5 stars

Master data quality KPI: 95%

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