Promotions, pack formats and retailer scorecards, planned to ship in full.
A consumer goods plant is graded by its customers every week. Retailers measure on-time-in-full and deduct for every short delivery. Promotions move volume by pallets at short notice. A line runs several pack formats at different speeds, and every change costs parts and time. Stock is date coded, so building ahead is a bet, and the peak needs agency crews and a co-packer who has other customers. Orvixo holds the line rates, the changeovers, the code life and the crews in one model and re-solves the plan when the order book moves.
What makes consumer goods hard to plan
The customer keeps the score
Grocers and mass retailers measure every supplier on on-time-in-full. A short pallet is a deduction; a missed booking slot at the distribution centre is a refused delivery; a bad quarter is a delisting conversation. The plan is graded by someone who never sees the plant.
Promotions move volume by weeks, not days
A feature or a multibuy can lift a SKU several times over for a fortnight and then drop it below base. Confirmations arrive late, uplifts are revised, and the promo pack is often a different SKU with its own artwork and its own code life.
Every format change costs parts and speed
A filler that runs 500 ml and 1 litre, singles and multipacks, changes over with different change parts, a new set-up and a run-up at reduced speed. Line rate depends on the format, and a shift with three changes is a shift with two hours less output.
Stock is date coded
Retailers require a minimum life on receipt. Building ahead of a promotion protects the service level but risks packs that expire when the offer ends. Building late risks the delivery slot. Neither is safe without the dates in the plan.
Peaks run on people you do not have yet
Seasonal volume needs agency crews trained for the line, on shifts a fixed roster does not cover. The constraint in November is trained people, not machines.
The co-packer has other customers
Outsourced capacity absorbs peaks and promo packs, but it has to be booked, materials have to be transferred, and its lead time is not yours. What goes out of house is a plan decision, not a phone call.
How Orvixo plans it
Service level in the objective
Every retailer’s delivery slots and service targets are constraints. The plan protects on-time-in-full first and shows which order is exposed if capacity runs out, before the slot, not after it.
Promotions as demand with dates
Promo uplifts, their confirmation dates and their end dates are in the model. The plan builds the promo pack in the window that protects the launch without stranding stock when the offer closes.
Formats sequenced, not inherited
Changeover time and line rate per format are rules. The plan groups runs by format and pack size so a filler changes once where it used to change three times.
Code life in the plan
Every SKU carries its code life and each retailer’s minimum life on receipt. Stock is built in the window that lands with the life required, oldest out first.
Crews, shifts and co-packers together
Agency crews, training and shift patterns are resources, and so is the co-packer’s booked capacity. The plan decides what runs in house, what goes out, and who needs to be on shift, in the same solve.
Re-solve on amendment
When the order book changes on Thursday, the plan re-solves in seconds and explains every move. Your planners review and publish, or let Orvixo publish within your rules.
The ones your best planner already knows.
Written in plain language by your team, compiled by Orvixo into constraints the plan must respect. These are the ones we see in most consumer goods plants.
See it on your lines.
Talk us through how your plant plans today. We will show you where Orvixo would change it.