Joint Microsoft and ToolsGroup planning solution will support POOLCORP’s goals of improved service to customers and increased profitability amid demand and supply volatility
ToolsGroup, a global leader in supply chain planning and optimization software, has been selected by POOLCORP to support its goals of improved supply chain resilience and service to customers while increasing profitability.
With more than 4,500 employees and over 400 locations worldwide, POOLCORP is the world’s largest wholesale distributor of swimming pool supplies, equipment, and related leisure products. Headquartered in Louisiana, POOLCORP serves roughly 120,000 wholesale customers around the world. The home-centric trends from the pandemic created heightened demand for residential pool, irrigation and landscape and related outdoor-living products. Combined with continued supply chain challenges, these trends accelerated POOLCORP’s desire to create a more robust and resilient supply network. ToolsGroup’s service-driven multi-echelon inventory optimization (MEIO) provides a single view of demand and supply to help manage uncertainty and increase product availability.
“We are relentlessly focused on product availability excellence for the builders, retailers, and service professionals we serve every day,” said David Collier, POOLCORP’s VP of Operations and Supply Chain. “In ToolsGroup, we see an innovative partner that will position us to leverage proven technology and analytics to ensure we have what our customers need, where they need it, and when they need it.”
With ToolsGroup Service Optimizer 99+ at the core, POOLCORP will embark on a journey to optimize planning of over 1 million SKU/locations across a network of four regional distribution centers and nearly 400 sales centers in North America and Europe. This planning transformation is part of a wider digital supply chain transformation that will equip POOLCORP for success amid continued demand and supply disruptions.
POOLCORP will implement AI-powered demand planning and forecasting, demand collaboration, multi-echelon inventory optimization and replenishment along with advanced machine learning for new product forecasting and seasonality clustering.
“Recent supply disruptions have made supply chain agility even more crucial,” said David Barton, ToolsGroup’s general manager of North America. “We’re excited to work alongside Microsoft to help POOLCORP make the most efficient use of inventory to serve their customers more effectively and continue to lead in their market.”
About Pool Corporation
Pool Corporation is the world’s largest wholesale distributor of swimming pool and related backyard products. POOLCORP operates approximately 410 sales centers in North America, Europe and Australia, through which it distributes more than 200,000 national brand and private label products to roughly 120,000 wholesale customers.
For more information about POOLCORP, please visit www.poolcorp.com.
About ToolsGroup
ToolsGroup is how organizations achieve their target service levels while optimizing inventory, no matter how complex their supply chain is or how much demand changes. In a world that never follows the rules, organizations have to be ready for anything–from the challenges of multi-echelon inventory optimization to the endless surprises of sporadic demand. To do this, they have to predict more behaviors, protect against surprises, and perform more efficiently. Only ToolsGroup makes all this possible. That’s why global leaders like Absolut, BP and Harley-Davidson continue to rely on us year after year. Visit www.ToolsGroup.com and follow us on Twitter @ToolsGroup.