Quest, the multi-brand, Columbia-based urban clothing retailer, will utilise Centric Software, Inc., to provide its product lifecycle management (PLM) solution.
Quest designs and develops jeans, tops, backpacks, footwear and accessories for men, women and young men. The company sells through its 70 stores plus 11 franchise stores in Colombia. Quest, a leading fashion company in the region, is positioning for rapid international expansion to larger cities and markets including plans to open five new franchises in Ecuador and Peru in the near term.
"Currently, our processes are entirely manual, meaning we use pencil, paper and a home-grown, legacy system to manage product development," says Olga España, director of projects and processes at Quest. "Making our overall process more efficient is key to our ability to achieve our ambitious growth goals."
That's where Centric comes in, notes España. She explains that Quest will use PLM to support product development, sourcing, materials management, quality management and merchandise planning. Looking forward to the project, Quest will gain more control over raw material costs in addition to overall better budget management. "Frankly, we've lost money on inventory in the past and we must reign that in so we can achieve our growth goals."
Centric 8 will also improve visibility, enable better decision making, assure product quality, and allow Quest to make "go/no-go" decisions earlier in order to mitigate losses, adds España. "Improving our quality controls in this way will help to improve our image in the marketplace and bolster our brand recognition as we branch out into new markets."
España explains that when searching for a PLM provider, one major requirement for Quest was the ability to integrate with the company's existing ERP system, which Centric can do seamlessly. Other factors that tipped the scales in Centric's favour include: rich PLM functionality; Centric's rapid, out-of-the-box implementation process, fuelled by Centric's Agile Deployment™ methodology; and the company's strong global references.
Centric's president and CEO Chris Groves says that since Centric 8 was built specifically with the needs of retail, apparel, footwear and consumer goods companies in mind, Quest will see benefits in 3-4 months, maybe even sooner. "We are excited to be part of Quest's growth plans. Because we incorporate best practices into the Centric 8 platform, we can help assure orderly and profitable growth as Quest expands into new markets."
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