Egmont Improves Forecasting, Reduces Stock and Optimizes Inventory Management with EazyStock

Egmont is the largest specialist children’s book publisher in the UK with over one million children reading their publications every month. They manage around 1,200 titles which get manufactured in the UK, Europe and the Far East and are stored at a third-party distributor who ships them out to well-known retailers across the UK.

✓ The challenge: Tighter stock control management

Egmont are experts at creating books to encourage children to engage in reading. However, critical to their profitability is tight stock management, so their leadership team approached EazyStock for an automated solution.

“We knew we needed a more sophisticated way to forecast demand and manage our inventory levels. The sales of some of our publications can be erratic, and depending on where we print, a delivery can take up to three and a half months to arrive at the warehouse. Ensuring we can meet market demand for our core titles is critical, but, at the same time, we don’t want to see excess stock beginning to pile up, undermining our profitability” explains James Bensberg, Director of Systems & Business Support.

✓ The solution: Custom integrations and data feeds

The EazyStock team worked with Egmont to build integrations and data transfers from their key business platforms. EazyStock was configured to import data from Egmont’s production system, to constantly update print orders, supplier lead times and incoming order quantities, and to accept a regular feed from the distributor’s WMS, for daily stock levels and movements.

✓ The impact: 10% reduction in stock levels, improved forecasting and reduced risk

After ten months, EazyStock has already had a dramatic effect on how Egmont manage their inventory.

“EazyStock-generated demand forecasts are now the basis of all stock management discussions”. As James explains, “Previously we calculated sales forecasts based on a number of variables and ‘educated estimates’, and we used these to decide which titles to reprint and which to hold back. Now we have confidence that the decisions we’re making are based on reliable data and sophisticated forecast calculations”.

In addition, EazyStock has allowed Egmont to optimize their stock levels with overall stock in the warehouse reducing by 10% over ten months. More importantly the reduction is due to holding less stock of erratic titles, reducing the overall risk of the stock in the warehouse becoming obsolete.