How efficient are Ready-To-Sell packaging solutions through IKEAs supply chain?

Abstract: There are two purposes of thesis, the first is to determine: How efficient are Ready-To-Sell packaging solutions through IKEAs supply chain? And the second is to determine: To what level are Ready-To-Sell packaging solutions utilized at IKEA stores? If the solutions aren’t used as intended, what is the reason? Based on the result from the case study the objective is to: Identify possible potentials with Ready-To-Sell packaging solutions at IKEA. Ready-To-Sell has shown to be cost efficient for pallet solutions, all products didn’t give a significant saving but a trend was found that Picking cost in warehouse impacts mostly. The thesis found Ready-To-Sell shelf solutions to be cost inefficient in general. This since the expenses of Material overcomes the savings from Replenish, the factors that mainly are affected. Shelf Tray is less time efficient than pallet solutions, and some Shelf Tray products aren’t time efficient at all. This is on contrary to pallet solutions which are significantly more time efficient. Replenish cost doesn’t have a great impact of the financial savings but co-workers are very satisfied with quick replenishment and value the time saving high, it enable them to handle more article numbers during refill hours. Increased availability leads to more products in store which may impacts total sales. Ready-To-Sell pallet solutions are utilized to almost 90% while the shelf solutions are utilized to 65%. Oversized packages are the main reason why not using the solutions according co-workers. It was also found that there is a connection between utilization and education concerning the impact of Ready-To-Sell solutions. There is a saving potential using Ready-To-Sell pallet solution, especially when Regular package would have had picking in warehouse since it’s the cost factor impacting savings mostly.