Rapala (www.rapala.com) is the world’s leading brand of fishing lures. With factories in Finland, France, Ireland, Estonia, and China, Rapala manufactures approximately 20 million lures a year. The company operates 26 Rapala VMC distribution companies, which sell its products in more than 140 countries.
An Increasingly Complex Global Supply Chain
In the U.S. alone, Rapala processes 33,000 orders, supports 11,600 active SKUs, and schedules and ships 3.2 million pounds of freight with ship-to addresses in every state per year.
Rapala’s customers include many household names in the retail industry such as Target and Wal-Mart, as well as leading sporting goods retailers including, Cabela’s, Dick’s Sporting Goods, and Gander Mountain. Customers require Rapala to support a wide variety of EDI transactions such as purchase orders, purchase order acknowledgements, inbound purchase order changes, invoices, advanced ship notices, and inbound text messages.
With its high sales volume, diverse product line, and broad customer base, Rapala must support an increasingly complex supply chain.
Reaping the Benefits of Outsourced EDI
Prior to working with SPS Commerce, Rapala managed its own EDI system. Over the past several years, more of Rapala’s customers were requiring EDI and upgrading to new release levels. When an in-house EDI resource decided to leave, Rapala made a strategic decision to outsource its EDI operations instead of hiring a new EDI specialist. EDI outsourcing appealed to Rapala, as the company sought an alternative to unpredictable charges. And more importantly, Rapala realized that EDI was not a core competency of its business.
Rapala chose to partner with SPS Commerce because of its broad outsourced EDI capabilities. Based on its experience working with many of Rapala’s retail customers, SPS Commerce quickly leveraged its existing maps for Rapala’s EDI transactions and matched file layouts with Rapala’s JD Edwards system.
The implementation, which began in early 2007, went extremely well. Because of the teamwork between the two companies based on best practices, Rapala was able to start its 2008 EDI initiative ahead of schedule in 2007.
As a result of this partnership, Rapala immediately eliminated unpredictable charges and replaced them with predictable monthly service fees. Rapala also reduced EDI costs by eliminating software maintenance as well as its EDI server. In addition, Rapala eliminated the need to hire a new EDI person and was able to redeploy its EDI administrator on more productive projects.
Working under the SaaS EDI model, Rapala feels better positioned to respond to new and changing customer trading requirements. Best of all, by entrusting its EDI processing to the SPS Commerce team of experts, Rapala can stay focused on running its business.
