Motor Coach Industries is now geared with SmartForecasts
Customer satisfaction is one of the important factors that has to be considered in about every business. An aftermarket parts company, Motor Coach Industries (MCI) knows this, thus it decided to avail Smart Software Inc.’s SmartForecasts Enterprise.
MCI’s inventory management in its aftermarket service parts operation is expected to improve with the SmartForecasts Enterprise. With more than 2,000 employees, the company will utilize the SmartForecasts’ patented intermittent demand forecasting and planning capabilities. With this helpful software, forecasting and inventory for MCI’s 12 North American facilities will be made easier. Not only that, SmartForecasts will also be able to systematize vendor managed inventory business, increasing parts availability and providing better customer service.
In the United States and Canada, aftermarket company MCI has headquartered wherein the company’s products are designed, manufactured, and sold. MCI’ products include motor coaches, bus replacement parts, amongst others. Aside from the products, this aftermarket parts company also offers repair services to its customers.
It was really hard and manual work for the company when it comes to forecasting before it decided to make use of SmartForecasts’ services. Imagine that MCI used to forecast everything manually at each of its service centers. A lot of time and effort were used for this, so availing of the said software was the only way to go. Forecasting and planning procedures and began an evaluation of demand planning, forecasting and inventory optimization software systems. Furthermore, the Massachusetts-based MCI chose SmartForecasts because it is capable of giving accurate results right off the bat.
“An important part of our evaluation compared stocking level estimates provided by the different vendors. SmartForecasts’ stocking level estimates were the most accurate and resulted in not only lower projected inventory costs but also a higher projected service level,” said Stan Dzierzega, inventory planning manager and project leader at MCI. “In addition to improving our service levels and reducing costs, we expect SmartForecasts will help us to reduce our demand planning workload. Manual planning takes too much time, and with SmartForecasts, we look forward to shortening the process, forecasting more items, and getting better forecast results and inventory recommendations.”