The Perfect Catch: How Simms Fishing Used Anvyl to Build a Supply Chain Ready for Growth
About Simms Fishing
Founded in 1980, Simms Fishing Products is a fishing equipment, accessories and apparel manufacturer in Bozeman, Montana. Known for its vast product lines, Simms has evolved into a major player in the ecommerce landscape and joined the Vista Outdoor family (now Revelyst) in 2022, aligning with giants like Fox, Bell, Giro and Camelbak.
Navigating Through a Stormy Sea
As Simms Fishing confronted the myriad challenges that rapidly growing brands face, including delivery delays and split shipments, they grappled with a lack of visibility across their supply chain. Alan Schroeder, Simms’ Purchasing and Supply Chain Manager, and his team recognized the pressing need for a unified platform that could serve as a ‘single source of truth’ for their supply chain throughout the life of each purchase order. While the onset of the pandemic added to these challenges, the primary focus remained on strengthening their supply chain operations.
One of the reasons that we selected Anvyl is that we were looking to add more accountability to our supply chain partners to own and manage the purchase orders. Anvyl is great because after placing the PO, our supply chain partners are able to easily update all of the milestones, ensuring that everything 100% lines up for our 3PL team.
Anvyl: The Anchor in Turbulent Waters
In their quest for clarity and cohesion across their supply chain, Simms Fishing turned to Anvyl in October 2020. Recognizing Anvyl’s capability to provide a transparent supply chain view and its ability to integrate with their MS Dynamics NAV ERP seamlessly, made Anvyl the right choice. Additionally, the Simms team wanted to waste no time leveraging Anvyl’s collaboration tools to work more closely with their suppliers to understand root causes for delays and to partner more effectively to find solutions. With Anvyl in place, the next challenge emerged: efficiently onboarding nearly 50 suppliers to collaborate on the platform. To tackle this, the team prioritized fast-track training, working closely with suppliers to ensure swift adoption.
Results
For Simms Fishing, the key to success was securing supplier adoption. Alan’s team took advantage of supply chain slowing down following the onset of the pandemic and leaned heavily on Anvyl’s supplier training and overseas support, simplifying processes and emphasizing adherence. “We worked hard to keep it simple while holding them accountable – and they did great,” remarked Alan.
We’ve greatly improved the efficiency of issuing purchase orders. The tool’s historical data really helped us to have the ability to quickly review and find all the messages and information relating to the life of a purchase order.
The emphasis on adoption during this slower period yielded tangible results. From a mere 32% of on-time orders in 2021, they nearly doubled their efficiency to 62% in just 11 months. Alan attributes the success of Simms’ improved supply chain in large part to successfully implementing and adopting Anvyl, but also to their supply chain getting back on track following the slowdown.
Future Casting the Net
After their acquisition by Vista Outdoor, Simms Fishing has ambitious plans to grow. Leaders like Alan Schroeder have recognized the importance of a streamlined supply chain and are looking to leverage Anvyl’s capabilities to achieve this growth.
Key strategic initiatives for the company include:
Annual Supplier Reviews
Utilizing Anvyl’s supplier scorecard, the team plans to conduct regular reviews showcasing supplier performance over time. This approach will ensure accountability and quality assurance from every partner.
Custom Feedback Fields
To identify trends and areas needing attention, the team will use Anvyl’s custom fields feature. They aim to create specialized dropdown options that facilitate more structured supplier feedback.
One significant area they’re targeting is delivery delays. By implementing mandatory fields where suppliers can select a reason for a delay from a custom-built dropdown menu, the team hopes to gain clearer insights into recurring issues.
Streamlined Workflows
To align with Simms’ business requirements and provide enhanced visibility across the supply chain, they’re looking to develop specialized workflows using Anvyl. These custom workflows will comprise milestones that mirror Simms’ operational processes, fostering improved collaboration and efficiency as the company scales.
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