Dimar Boosts Logistics Efficiency with Zebra Mobile Computers
Dimar, a leader in Italy’s retail sector since 1975, is committed to enhancing efficiency and customer satisfaction. Collaborating with Lexter Italia, Dimar implemented Zebra mobile computers to streamline operations and boost efficiency across its extensive network of outlets.
Zebra Success Story: Dimar S.p.A.
Overview: Retail Challenge
Dimar wanted to optimize its entire retail and logistics operation, from order receipt to shop floor management and self-stacking. The company needed a solution to improve item measurement capabilities, automate product reception audits, enhance forecasting and stock management, eliminate errors in recording package dimensions and streamline application management and device updates across its 125 sales points.
Benefits / Outcomes
- Improved item measurement capabilities to automate product reception audits
- Improved forecasting and stock management
- Streamlined application management and device update processes
About Dimar S.p.A.
Founded in 1975, the Dimar Group owns more than 100 retail outlets in Italy, including supermarkets, mini-markets, hypermarkets and discount stores. The group is based in Cherasco, Piedmont, and employs over 4,000 people across 125 sales points located between Piedmont and Liguria.
The group invests in technological innovation to support customer satisfaction, enhance local production and bolster collaboration with valued stakeholders and suppliers. This innovation is applied across software, hardware, process improvement and workflow organisation.
The Challenge
Some of Dimar’s logistical duties involve the delivery and management of missing items which helps improve customer service, both online and in the stores. Dimar is also focused on e-commerce sales, both store-fulfilled and direct, and innovates with point-of-sale automation to optimise operations.
Dimar needs precise measurements from suppliers describing external packaging and sub-packaging dimensions, which is managed throughout the supply chain and at the point of sale. Dimar must verify the quality of this information, measuring data to a 99.9% degree of accuracy with each item measured to the centimetre, with its exact dimensions precisely recorded. Dimar’s audit must also account for the categories of products being shipped, to enable items to be stored in the warehouse and positioned correctly on the shop floor and at the point of sale.
This new rollout enables us to manage logistics devices in an automated and standardised way. This is essential when each point of sale contains approximately 10 terminals, which when multiplied by 125 point of sale locations, means managing thousands of devices.
The Solution
“We wanted our logistics operations to be smarter and more automated, particularly for measuring the size of shipping packages,” says Livio Bernocco, CIO at Dimar. “This visibility is essential for calculating and forecasting volumes of goods and optimising materials and their management, transportation and associated costs.”
To achieve this, Dimar collaborated Lexter Italia. Lexter is a Zebra Premier Solutions and Registered ISV Partner based in Milan that supplies integrated automatic identification solutions to the industrial, logistics, port and retail sectors.
As part of this collaboration, Dimar chose Zebra’s handheld TC53 mobile computers to allow workers to access the information and applications required to manage critical logistics.
The TC53 is among the new generation of Zebra mobile computers, containing revolutionary time of flight sensor technology for mobile dimensioning. The devices use Wi-Fi 6E, and feature large and bright 6” screen to let workers see and do more. The integrated mobile dimensioning on the TC53 are vital for Dimar’s logistics centres, enabling reliable shipping volume calculations and optimising costs and activities.
Previously, operators had to manually record package dimensions, risking data entry errors and wasting time. With the new Zebra mobile computers with integrated scanners and mobile dimensioning, logistics portals are automatically updated in real time flawlessly.
“Benefits of the TC53 with Mobile Dimensioning for Dimar principally include speeding up the measurement of packages arriving at the warehouse and simplifying and safeguarding the quality of operational data,” says Bernocco. “This enables more efficient and accurate goods storage and transportation, as well as stock optimisation.”
The devices also enable greater accuracy of logistics data and derived metrics, with 50 measurements per week registered with the TC53. These devices, supported by an app with the software development kit integrated with Dimar’s management system, have allowed Dimar to unify and improve data maintenance, eliminating manual data entry, thus reducing measurement time by 50%.
For supermarkets, Dimar chose the Zebra TC52 handheld computer for electronic labelling. The devices feature a 5-inch capacitive HD touch display, rugged with high drop specs to 1.2m and have 14 hours of battery power. The TC52 is certified according to IP 65/67 standards against splash water and dust.
For store management, Dimar chose the Zebra TC21 and TC22 handheld computers. Both feature Wi-Fi for indoor workers. The devices enable information coming from the stores to be processed with web services in real time, online.
The Zebra Difference: Outcome and Benefits
Dimar chose Zebra for the robustness of its software development kits (SDKs) and their adaptability, allowing Dimar to customise 100% of the application and its features.
Furthermore, the native integration between SOTI and Zebra provided Dimar with more functionality than other competitors with greater control over point-of-sale terminals.
If Dimar needs to enable targeted operations, Zebra’s tools are compatible with mobile device management. This enables firmware to be updated to implement interventions and centralise operations, automating the management of the devices. When a terminal is sent to the point of sale, enterprise enrolment is performed by reading a QR code, which allows the devices to be configured simply, standardising the processes.
Furthermore, application lifecycle management can be simplified, enabling faster software updates and tests. Previously, the testing phase could last up to a month. Thanks to Zebra this time was reduced to a week, cutting the testing phase and implementation to a quarter of the time required previously.
“This new rollout enables us to manage logistics devices in an automated and standardised way,” says Bernocco. “This is essential when each point of sale contains approximately 10 terminals, which when multiplied by 125 point of sale locations, means managing thousands of devices.”
Being able to rely on Zebra’s Android devices has allowed Dimar to utilise UX standards and graphic interfaces familiar to everyone, while transporting a range of functions onto a mobile device.
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