Inventory Allocation

As the SVP of Global Business Development for Sunrise Technologies, Cem Item serves as a trusted advisor to C-level executives running large global enterprises. He conducts corporate business strategy engagements and digital transformation workshops around the world. With over 20 years of consulting experience, Cem specializes in the textile, apparel, footwear, home furnishings, consumer goods manufacturing, and retail industries.

If hard allocation is the hammer and nails of supply chain, soft allocation is like magnets and a whiteboard.

Defining soft and hard allocation

Allocation (the point where supply meets demand) is one of the most important pieces of the supply chain. So many critical business processes— customer service, inventory, sales — start hinge on smart allocation. Among supply chain professionals, software vendors, and other stakeholders, different words and terms get thrown around and people get confused. Here’s our point of view on hard and soft allocation, and challenges within each.

Very simply, hard allocation means the commitment between supply and demand cannot be changed. It’s been finalized, agreed upon, and now items are ready to go. Soft allocation, on the other hand, has a little wiggle room. Supply can shift as needed. Both practices play an important role in the supply chain, but typically we expect allocation to start out soft. Over time, as conditions change, allocation should get harder. During the planning process, hard and soft allocation can even be tied together.

Key differences between hard and soft allocation

Soft allocation

Supply is flexible, depending on changes to demand. It’s possible to shift quantities and orders as needed.
Usually, in the early stages of planning, soft allocation is the name of the game. Delivery is a long way off.
Deals with planned and firm entities alike.
More planning-oriented.

Hard allocation

Supply is committed to the demand, with no changes.
Delivery date is very soon…think days or weeks.
Only interested in firm entities.
More execution-oriented.

Challenges in the planning process

Planning usually starts with a forecast. Over time, orders are placed and users compare them to the forecast and adjust. The type of business can dictate how planning is handled. For example, wholesale businesses that gradually firm up demand over time may have semi-firm demand like a bulk or blanket sales order. For retail or eCommerce businesses, demand is never locked in until a customer places an order. Things get really complex for companies with multiple channels – retail, ecommerce, and wholesale, for example. Every channel requires different demand planning, from forecasting to bulk orders to placing actual orders.

Meanwhile, you also have planned purchase orders or production orders. Over time, these planned orders are scheduled, or goods are produced and delivered, and placed in inventory. All along the way, a company is juggling many types of supply (planned orders, in-progress orders, inventory, etc.) alongside many types of demand (the forecast, sales orders, standing bulk sales orders, etc.) And it’s the supply chain’s job to strike the delicate balance between the two.

How soft allocation helps you manage your supply chain

Let’s say you’ve just begun a new season, or otherwise in the beginning of the planning cycle. At this point, few orders are confirmed. You have a forecast, but products are still on order or in production, or something in between. This is the worst possible time to start hard allocating supply against the demand. You’ll encounter both inventory headaches from all the effort to re-organize and re-plan when orders are canceled or rescheduled, and you’ll have a bunch of customer service problems, too. This is the time when you should go with the flow. This is where soft allocation is your superstar.

If hard allocation is the hammer and nails of supply chain, soft allocation is like magnets and a whiteboard. While orders are being placed, you should be able to shift supply to demand as priorities change. Seeing the big picture — whether that’s by channel, customer, product, vendor, or other entities — is key to understanding and managing your supply chain for the best results.

Hard allocation comes into play when you’re ready to execute. At this point, you’re dealing with the firmest supply and demand (inventory and sales orders). Releasing the orders might be constrained by fulfillment rules, like no partial shipments, or at least fifty percent of line level is satisfied, or similar. Challenges at this stage are implementing these fulfillment rules while maximizing the amount of inventory that ships. The right allocation solution lets you set up and edit these constraints quickly and easily.

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Whether you’re exploring your options for new business platforms, or ready to get started, we are trusted business partners for some of the world’s most well-known brands. With over 25 years of experience with the Microsoft stack, we can help you understand all the capabilities Microsoft has to offer.

Analyst Reports: Read what industry experts say about Microsoft cloud solutions

Nucleus Research ERP Technology Value Matrix

The ERP Value Matrix reflects the continued shift to the cloud, with vendors seeing accelerated adoption rates. Microsoft continues in its Leader position with Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Supply Chain, Enterprise Edition. All the enterprise capabilities in Microsoft Dynamics for Finance and Supply Chain, Enterprise edition are underpinned by Microsoft’s global delivery strategy that includes 36 geographies and over 60 language localizations. Additionally, the Microsoft business application platform delivers capabilities such as Power Apps, Power BI, Power Automate, and the Microsoft Dataverse (formerly Common Data Service), helping customers better collect and analyze their data as well as build applications to automate manual tasks.

Microsoft, A Leader in the Magic Quadrant for Cloud ERP

Product-centric organizations are increasingly adopting cloud ERP platforms to standardize operations and drive intelligent automation. The 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ recognizes Microsoft as a Leader for its ongoing innovation and proven ability to support scalable, composable transformation across finance and operations.

The Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Dynamics Supply Chain

Microsoft Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management addresses key supply chain challenges. These include limited visibility, adapting to changing customer demands, outdated systems, and disruptions. The solution enhances visibility across the supply chain network, enabling better planning, agility, and asset uptime optimization, ensuring smooth operations even during disruptions. Forrester Consulting conducted a Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study to assess the potential ROI of deploying Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management. The investment led to significant benefits, including:

Increased production volume capacity by 10% to 15% due to faster time-to-market.
Enhanced operational efficiency with a 2% to 3% reduction in unplanned machine downtime, worth over $1.5 million over three years and 500 manufacturing machines.
Increased developer productivity by 10% to 50%, reallocating developer time for higher-value tasks.
A 5% boost in revenue attributed to improved product quality, translating to more than $6.8 million in three years.
Infrastructure footprint consolidation of 35% to 65% by shifting from on-premises to cloud solutions, saving close to $11 million over three years.

The Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Dynamics Finance

Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct a Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study and examine the potential return on investment (ROI) enterprises may realize by deploying Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance. The purpose of this study is to provide readers with a framework to evaluate the potential financial impact of Dynamics 365 Finance on their organizations.

To better understand the benefits, costs, and risks associated with this investment, Forrester interviewed four representatives with experience using Dynamics 365 Finance. For the purposes of this study, Forrester aggregated the interviewees’ experiences and combined the results into a single composite organization that is a retail and wholesale organization with 120 finance personnel and revenue of $750 million per year.

Above Average ROI from Dynamics 365

In analyzing the results of Microsoft Dynamics 365 deployments, Nucleus found that for every dollar spent, companies realized an average of $16.97 in returns. This is significantly higher than the average for both enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM), which deliver, on average, $7.23 and $8.71 respectively. Nucleus found that companies taking advantage of Microsoft’s investments in cloud and usability, as well as integration and analytics, were able to achieve significant returns by increasing productivity and revenues and reducing costs. Microsoft’s integration of business capabilities such as ERP, CRM, and HCM with Office 365, Power BI, Power Platform, and Azure offer even greater value than the industry averages and as Microsoft makes further investments in integration and innovation, customers will benefit from the additional value provided by the cloud platform.

The Total Economic Impact™ of Power Apps

Adopting Power Apps can transform a company’s IT function from a blocker to an enabler. One interviewee in the Forrester Total Economic Impact Study said: “We can now build once and deploy to different places….We can now make changes on the fly and support a very dynamic business.” Benefits included:

74 percent less cost to develop an application
188 percent ROI over 3 years, with a net present value of $6.1 million
Average payback period is less than 6 months

The Digital Commerce Imperative

A staggering seventy-six percent of retail and CPG decision-makers agree that improving digital commerce capabilities is their most urgent business priority. And yet for many organizations running on legacy or disparate systems, this goal is far out of reach. Microsoft commissioned Forrester to evaluate how retail and CPG companies are approaching digital commerce improvements today. In this thought leadership report, read key insights about the state of the retail and CPG industries in a post-pandemic world, and how technology leaders plan to invest to make true unified commerce a reality.

The Total Economic Impact™ Of Microsoft Dynamics 365 For Finance And Operations

Cloud simplicity, gained agility, improved user adoption, and enhanced security were a few of the benefits of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations. The quantitative benefits over a three year period included:

Increased wholesale revenue by 3 percent, retail revenue by 4 percent and decreased excess inventory and shrinkage by 10 percent
Operational efficiencies reduced cost of goods sold by 10 percent and improved gross margin by 2.4 percent
Employee productivity gains reduced shop floor staffing by 6 percent, increased finance productive by 20 percent, and increased sales productivity by 4 percent
Total benefits resulted in a 60 percent ROI and a 20 month payback period, including legacy license, maintenance, hardware, and admin cost avoidance

The Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Dynamics Commerce

Dynamics 365 Commerce provides a seamless shopping experience across physical and digital channels. Customers using a network of disparate and inflexible legacy solutions stand to save significant time and money by moving to an integrated omni-channel solution like Commerce. Forrester’s Total Economic Impact study of Dynamics 365 Commerce found:

Improved inventory management to the tune of $3.7 million
Saved $1.9 million through decreased training time
Increased brick and mortar sales by $1.5 million
25 percent eCommerce sales uplift
Payback period of only 17 months

Microsoft Security a Leader in 5 Magic Quadrants

Gartner has named Microsoft Security a Leader in five Magic Quadrants. This is exciting news that we believe speaks to the breadth and depth of our security offerings. Microsoft was identified as a Leader in the following five security areas:

Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) solutions
Access Management
Enterprise Information Archiving
Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) tools
Endpoint Protection Platforms

The Total Economic Impact™ Of Microsoft Azure IaaS

Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct a study to examine the potential return on investment (ROI) enterprises may realize by shifting some or all their management and operations from on-premises, hosted, and outsourced implementations to Azure’s infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) offering. Benefits included:

Improved production efficiency
Reduced datacenter, IT resource, and outsourcing costs
Easier and faster software and hardware management (such as patching and support)

A Platform for Today, Tomorrow, and Decades from Now

Microsoft offers a complete platform at a tremendous value. When you consider the billions of dollars invested in research and development, cloud growth, and long term viability, an investment in Microsoft makes long term sense.

Ready to learn more about what Dynamics 365 can do for your business?

Virtual Warehouse

Warehouse data tells a story

Data tells a story about how a company runs its business. The warehouse table in particular — this core entity reveals so much about how a company manages its inventory. We’re fascinated by the creativity we see and how customers utilize their inventory data in so many ways.

A common setup: virtual warehouses

One way customers can manage inventory is by setting up virtual warehouses. This is when a warehouse that doesn’t exist in physical space is created in their inventory management system, and inventory is added. Virtual warehouses are a technique used to segment inventory. Think of it as “setting aside” a portion of your product for VIP customers or certain channels. Virtual warehouses aren’t necessarily a bad thing – if an important customer, region, or channel made an early commitment to your product, you definitely want to make sure that product is available to them. For single-channel brands or businesses with simple supply chains, virtual warehousing is a perfectly fine way to manage inventory, and a good business practice. But for omni-channel brands, or global organizations selling product in multiple countries, using virtual warehouses to segment inventory can cause problems.

How virtual warehouses cause problems in the supply chain

Problems start to happen when you set up dozens of virtual warehouses in the system to serve different channels, regions, and retail stores. Even though the warehouses are virtual, you still must deal with the same inventory management issues that crop up just like in a physical warehouse. There are overages and shortages. Demand fluctuates. Product that you “set aside” for your customers and channels changes, constantly, and now you must keep up with every warehouse you created. Different operational segments of the business may hide inventory from another, so they can ensure their fulfillment requests are met. It’s not uncommon for us to see a single warehouse storing product, yet the ERP system has four separate virtual locations. How can you fulfill orders from warehouses that don’t exist?

Fixes for virtual warehouses – that actually cause more problems

When businesses start to have these problems with virtual warehouses, they come up with a brilliant solution – virtual transfers! These cause their own sets of problems, though. When this happens, you’re moving too far away from the accurate, real-life understanding of your inventory. To fix this, companies ask their IT departments to write specific algorithms to automate these virtual transfers, which eats up more time and money. And all the while, the brand still must keep fulfilling orders and allocating product. What started out as a simple way to make every channel happy becomes a twisted nightmare of complex rules and business logic. There are also third-party solutions you can buy and implement to make virtual warehouse management easier. But at the end of the day, these solutions don’t fix the core problem: your virtual house inventory doesn’t match your physical inventory, and it’s hard for the business to make good decisions regarding fulfillment, allocation, and how to manage the supply chain.

The solution? Get rid of virtual warehouses

There is a solution for this virtual warehouse madness and prioritizing where inventory gets allocated. An intelligent soft allocation system can dramatically improve omni-channel inventory management. Soft allocation does this by pegging inventory to segments based on demand and supply from a single inventory point (aka a single warehouse). Instead of automating virtual transfers just to balance out inventory inaccuracies, soft allocation is configurable as demands change, with no complex rewriting or rules or algorithms. Users can prioritize inventory, while pulling from a single pool and maintaining global visibility across the entire system.

Frequently asked virtual warehouse questions

What's better, hard or soft allocation?

Soft allocation is the way to go. By keeping inventory transparent, you keep the supply chain moving quickly. Solutions can give you the flexibility to hard allocate once you’re ready to ship, but up until that point, you’ll want to be able to move orders around fast, without unnecessary data entry or manual processes.

If virtual warehouses are so problematic, is there still a case to use them?

We don’t consider virtual warehouses a best practice. For one thing, there is nothing fast about virtual warehouses. Once you start messing around with virtual transfers and virtual overages and shortages, you’ve moved too far away from reality, and your users are going to waste a lot of time trying to make your imaginary warehouse look right. At Sunrise, we advocate for having what’s in your system match your physical inventory, sticking as close to reality as possible.

Is this where negative inventory comes from?

Theoretically, yes, although it’s possible to put systems in place to prevent that. Even with extra business logic, though, solving one problem for virtual warehouses won’t fix everything that’s wrong with using them in the first place. Soft allocation prevents negative inventory from ever being an issue.

Why replace virtual warehouses with a soft allocation solution?

If your brand sells across multiple channels like retail, eCommerce, and wholesale, or they sell in multiple regions or countries, soft allocation is the way to go. The more complex an organization, the smarter it is to keep all the inventory in one big pool. It seems counterintuitive at first, but when done correctly, soft allocation ensures you can meet fulfillment demand and have an accurate, real-world view of your inventory across all your channels.

See how Dynamics 365 handles inventory management

Are you interested in learning more inventory best practices? Would you like to a see a modern, streamlined allocation solution that gives you both flexibility and accuracy? Contact Sunrise today!

Sunrise 365 certified for fashion: TEC report highlights

Providing Enhanced Retail and Supply Chain Solutions for D365

We already knew Dynamics 365 and Sunrise 365^® is a killer combo for brands and retailers. But we wanted a second opinion. Technology Evaluation Centers (TEC), a leading independent ERP software analyst firm, evaluated our Sunrise 365^® Supply Chain and Retail Replenishment solutions and compared against their comprehensive model of ERP for Fashion and Retail. The verdict?

Sunrise 365 for Supply Chain and Retail Replenishment provides essential industry extensions for fashion and consumer goods brands. Here are the key highlights of TEC’s report if you are considering Sunrise 365 for Dynamics 365 and your business is in fashion, apparel, or footwear.

How Sunrise 365® works with Dynamics 365

Sunrise Technologies is the developer of application extensions for Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations (D365) that have been built to manage the unique needs of manufacturers, distributors, and retailers of apparel, footwear, textiles, home furnishings, and similar consumer products.

The Sunrise 365^® Supply Chain and Sunrise 365^® Retail Replenishment products bring enhanced capabilities to D365 that are especially important to these industries. These capabilities include fully integrating the product variations, multichannel management, and automated processing and control of complex allocation schemes across the entire Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) application suite.

The Sunrise solutions extend the core Dynamics 365 application. Sunrise’s applications are seamlessly integrated into D365, so that users don’t have to know whether they are working in D365 or in the Sunrise applications.

Product extensions

Sunrise 365^® adds scale management, global trade item number (GTIN) reuse automation, season management, stock-keeping unit (SKU) lifecycle, and the product lifecycle management (PLM) integration framework to D365.

Scale management: supports dual sizing and NRF color and size codes, making it easier to manage products across multiple markets
GTIN: automation and reusability tools save time and money
Season management: tools to manage styles, colors, and delivery restrictions for seasons
Hard attributes: additional attributes like brand, category, and class allow for more specific sorting, filtering, and reporting
SKU lifecycle: item statuses allow for greater inventory control and specificity across the entire system
PLM integration framework: Sunrise’s framework greatly reduces the time and cost of integrating D365 with a PLM system

Sales extensions

The Sunrise 365^® Supply Chain extensions in sales include mark-for addresses, sales restrictions, sales cancellation log, sales order categories, sales order enhancements, bulk order management, and an automated order release. These extensions come with interactive, analytical dashboards that give users more insight into how products are flowing through the system.

Ship-to and mark-for addresses: allow orders to be earmarked for specific store
Sales restrictions: thresholds that restrict when an order can be released for shipment.
Sales cancellations: allow users to know more about why an order was cancelled.
Bulk order management: tracks orders and compares against a blanket or master order for all products over the course of a year or season.

Supply chain: where it all comes together

The supply chain extensions are where everything comes together. The tools in this area include support for forecasting, forecast netting, soft allocation, and supply chain analysis. Forecasts can be built that clearly define demand channels (e.g., web, wholesale, or retail). A planning workbench is not only a part of this extension but also a forecast integration framework for those who wish to work with other tools. Supply chain analysis adds other insights to business challenges such as channel rebalancing, scarce goods allocation, projected excess product inventory, unmet product demand, product supply suggestions, and product inventory projections.

One of the most impactful capabilities in Sunrise 365^® Supply Chain is the ability to manage what Sunrise calls “soft allocation” on inventory. Soft allocations let a user determine how to flexibly balance demand sequences to supply sequences and ensure that the demand will be appropriately supplied.

This is different from the “hard” allocation process, which occurs natively within Dynamics 365 and is not as flexible at meeting the more fluid requirements of Sunrise’s customers.

Sunrise 365® Retail Replenishment

Retailers need to stock the right products in the right stores at the right time. Sunrise 365^® Retail Replenishment is a relatively new product created by Sunrise to meet the demand of its customers, who were coming to them and asking whether they could help them manage retail replenishment without the steep prices associated with a third-party solution. Most of the solutions on the market are very expensive on their own. On top of the software costs, the costs to integrate these solutions with D365 are very steep.

The Sunrise retail replenishment tool brings together the retail store replenishment settings and rules and the actual inventory levels from the POS locations, and then it produces the appropriate retail plans.

In conclusion...

Sunrise 365^® brings great value, lowers the overall cost of ERP purchase and implementation, and brings faster deployment to its customers because of its tools and experience in these industries. Marquee customers such as Fila, Bioworld, and others rely on Sunrise to run their business. Anyone looking to purchase or upgrade their ERP system for these fluid consumer industries owes it to themselves to see what Sunrise can deliver for them.

Access the Fashion & Apparel Certification Report

Ready to take a deep dive into Sunrise 365? TEC’s full report shows you how Sunrise 365 stacks up against their comprehensive model for apparel and fashion ERP. If you want all the nitty-gritty details, check out the full report from TEC!

Sunrise 365 for Dynamics 365 is TEC certified for fashion, apparel and footwear

Sunrise 365 for Dynamics 365 is TEC Certified for Fashion, Apparel and Footwear

Sunrise is pleased to announce that Sunrise 365^® for Supply Chain and Retail Replenishment has been evaluated and certified for Fashion and Retail by TEC. Technology Evaluation Centers (TEC) is a leading software industry analyst firm.

To achieve TEC certification, software solution providers must conduct a demo of its product and submit a detailed functionality questionnaire. TEC analysts compare the solution against known benchmarks and provide a detailed review of the software’s features.

To learn how Sunrise 365’s extensions make Dynamics and Sunrise a perfect fit for brands and retailers, download the report today!

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How Frette modernized a heritage brand on Dynamics 365

This post first appeared on Microsoft’s Dynamics 365 blog. Read the original post here. Image: Frette.

One might think that the world’s oldest brands are least resistant to change—as if innovation and heritage are opposing ideas in business. Instead, we can learn a lot about endurance in modern business from brands that have adapted to change for decades or, in the case of luxury linen maker Frette, for more than 155 years.

Since 1860, Frette has crafted luxury linens found in the world’s most prestigious hotels, private homes, royal palaces—even the Titanic and Orient Express. Now the company is taking a big step to bridge it’s past, built on a tradition of quality and customer service, and its future, as an omnichannel business built on Dynamics 365.

Frette initially set out to update its point-of-sale system in its boutiques across the U.S. and Europe. Behind the scenes, however, the company was struggling to present customers with an omnichannel retail experience. The business operated on over a dozen legacy, outdated systems, so there was a need to unite lines of business across European and North American operations.

As Paolo Fabiocchi, CFO of Frette explains, “We started just by looking for a solution for our stores, but once we learned about Dynamics 365, our vision became having true omnichannel capabilities to better serve our customers. That the solution (Dynamics 365) has global, Tier 1 capabilities but is still so much less complex and costly to maintain was what really put it over the top for us.”

Frette met with Sunrise Technologies, an award-winning Dynamics 365 partner, to help modernize the business. Sunrise focused on solving several key challenges, connecting Frette’s business ecosystem, improving visibility across the organization, and automating manual, error-prone processes.

Unifying operations on a modern cloud platform

For many companies, legacy modernization is a daunting initiative, and Frette’s challenge was no exception. The company has multiple divisions to handle hospitality, wholesale, consultancy, and retail businesses—with divisions segmented across Europe, North America, and Asia. With disjointed systems and databases, customer service agents had limited access to inventory and orders, and customers experienced increased order processing times and wait times to check order statuses.

On Dynamics 365, Frette is unifying international systems and business processes. By dismantling data silos, they now have a single platform to run operations—from production to back office to POS. Best of all, Frette can unlock company data for a holistic, 360-degree view of the business, customers, and employees. For example, they can now follow an order from production in Italy to a boutique in New York, with real-time order and inventory status available to frontline workers. Frette also expects to explore IoT, machine learning, and other emerging technologies that will provide pervasive intelligence to reveal insights and trends across the organization.

Automation, everywhere

With company data like orders and inventory scattered across silos, Frette struggled with highly manual processes and a lack of visibility at every level of the organization, from the call center to the C-Suite. Overstocking was common to ensure popular items were on hand. The B2B hospitality business had increased staff by 30 percent in three years to keep up with manual order entries. Ecommerce orders had to be manually duplicated between the POS system and distribution systems. And returning an ecommerce order in store caused hassles on the back end.

Sunrise Technologies focused on streamlining and automating the business, including implementation of its custom supply chain solution that seamlessly integrates with Dynamics 365. Now Frette has a single platform that eliminates time-consuming, error-prone processes while seeing everything from inventory levels, orders, and allocation scenarios in one place.

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Apparel roadmap

Apparel Roadmap

Sunrise teamed up with Apparel Magazine for this technology roadmap, focusing on actionable steps for successful supply chain management.

4 Steps for Successful Apparel SCM

Determine your ideal business architecture
Get to the root cause of problems
Select the right technology to support your journey
Blend intuition with data-driven insights

A new generation of sophisticated technologies is transforming apparel manufacturers and retailers into a highly connected, intelligent, and more productive industry. Microsoft Dynamics 365 can help you:

Create intelligent value changes
Enhance digital shop floors, warehouses, distribution centers, and retail centers
Spot issues in the supply chain before they materialize

Read more in the full roadmap (6 page PDF) or explore Microsoft Dynamics 365 for apparel and fashion in more detail.

Get Your Money's Worth

Save time and gain instant value when you deploy Microsoft Dynamics 365 with Sunrise industry extensions.

How modern ERP better manages complex operations

As the SVP of Global Business Development for Sunrise Technologies, Cem Item brings nearly 20 years of experience in business systems experience in the textile, apparel, footwear, home furnishings, retail, and consumer goods industries. He offers a deep supply chain understanding in manufacturing, distribution, and retail operations with knowledge of ERP, CRM, POS, and BI systems. For Sunrise clients with operations across North America, Europe, and Asia, Cem provides thought leadership and guidance throughout the evaluation process of Microsoft Dynamics 365, business system strategy and a vision for digital transformation.

Over the years, we’ve had hundreds of successful go lives with consumer brands, manufacturers, and distributors. With that many implementations under our belt, we’ve been able to gain a different perspective on how modern, cloud-based, business applications better manage complex operations. Even though our clients have very different products and processes, we see the same industry challenges over and over. The good news is we’re able to solve them with modern ERP and CRM applications. We were inspired to share some of the common challenges we see (and fix) after our recent joint presentation with Ultra Consultants. You can watch the recording here to learn more and see a quick overview demo.

Complex Operations Are Cumbersome to Manage With Outdated Legacy Systems

So why do so many organizations try to battle the same challenges with outdated technology? Nearly all businesses have faced the same evolution of technology over the past few decades. Moving from no packaged software to point applications that couldn’t do it all, companies have ended up with a patchwork of integrations and homegrown solutions. As businesses became more complex and global, the Frankenstein infrastructures continued to get more custom, and more painful to manage. Most commonly, we see these legacy systems have a really hard time managing:

Product Variations
- Size, color, unit counts, packaging, etc…the list of combinations that cause complexity goes on and on
- Older legacy systems don’t store these attributes well and the variations can cause a lot of headaches
- Simple questions become difficult to answer because reporting, planning, and overall inventory management is extremely challenging in these older systems

Multiple Channels
- Once items with a complex product structure begin moving through multiple channels, it becomes dynamic and even harder to track
- In many cases, the lack of clear visibility into supply leaves organizations scrambling
- Legacy systems struggle to support the unique aspects of each unique channel (dropship, eCommerce direct to consumer, B2B sales and wholesale, and retail stores)

Prioritizing Scarce Goods Allocation
- Older legacy systems take a first-in, first-out approach to orders
- Often, consumer brands will want to fulfill important orders first (like to their big box store clients) over the eCommerce website, or smaller mom and pop stores
- Legacy systems require creative workarounds like hiding inventory or virtual warehouses which are difficult to manage and lead to missed sales

Does Your Organization Currently Utilize Technology that Meets Your Operational Needs?
Poll results during the webinar found that 63% of organizations were dealing with friction created by legacy systems. Every organization will likely come to a digital transformation crossroads in which they will be forced to upgrade or implement new enterprise technology to better manage the organization’s complexities. More than 50% are considering the cloud because of the advantages it provides. Curious about how the cloud may benefit you? Check out our cloud eBook for more details.

If you’d like to see a demo of how Sunrise and Microsoft Dynamics 365 can solve some of the challenges outlined above, you can watch the webinar recording here.

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How home furnishings brands can grow and flourish in 2019

Since Sunrise is headquartered in North Carolina, we are surrounded with reminders of the home furnishings industry. We even have the world’s largest chair. Everyone knows that mid-April and mid-October are terrible times to host out-of-town guests, as every hotel, restaurant, and highway is packed with the 80,000 people attending the High Point Furniture Market (or just “Market” to the locals). And yet, even though the home furnishings industry has such a big role in the economy, both locally and nationally, it is facing increasingly tough challenges.

There are the historical issues, like rising costs, and the ever-present desire to cut costs and increase profitability, but new concerns are working their way into the mix. The effort to keep costs low and profits high has led to increasingly complex, global supply chains.

Changing buyer behavior means potentially expanding into new channels, providing value-added service to brick-and-mortar locations, and an emphasis on exceptional customer service. These challenges are all part of the everyday conversation for furnishings executives – and it’s a lot to keep up with! This is especially true if the organization’s foundational technology is outdated or no longer a good fit for this more complex operational environment.

We’ve compiled nine of these common challenges (and their solutions!) into a new, interactive eBook. Each page addresses an issue that can put a strain on business operations, the underlying technological infrastructure, and ways to address them – before they impact the bottom line. Get your free copy today!

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Apparel operations in the cloud

Your Clothes Aren't One Size Fits All...and Neither Is The Cloud

It’s one thing if your “one size fits all” sweatpants start getting a little tight. But what happens when your business solutions start feeling pinched?

Prior to the mechanized loom, apparel manufacturing was a slow, costly business. Thanks to the industrial revolution, apparel manufacturers, retailers, and sourcing organizations are able to (mostly) keep up with a dizzying pace of change. We are in the midst of another revolution, but a technical one. Just as you wouldn’t use a foot powered sewing machine to make your clothes, the time of antiquated, inflexible, monolithic business systems is over.

Sunrise Customer Stories

Chrome Hearts Store: Apparel and Accessories Trend Setter Grows with Microsoft ERP

Get Your Money's Worth

Save time and gain instant value when you deploy Microsoft Dynamics 365 with Sunrise industry extensions.

Soft and hard allocation: understanding the difference

If hard allocation is the hammer and nails of supply chain, soft allocation is like magnets and a whiteboard.

Defining soft and hard allocation

Key differences between hard and soft allocation

Soft allocation

Hard allocation

Challenges in the planning process

How soft allocation helps you manage your supply chain

Further Reading

Start Your Journey with Sunrise Today!

Considering Microsoft Dynamics 365? Get Insights from Experts

Nucleus Research ERP Technology Value Matrix

Microsoft, A Leader in the Magic Quadrant for Cloud ERP

The Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Dynamics Supply Chain

The Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Dynamics Finance

Above Average ROI from Dynamics 365

The Total Economic Impact™ of Power Apps

The Digital Commerce Imperative

The Total Economic Impact™ Of Microsoft Dynamics 365 For Finance And Operations

The Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Dynamics Commerce

Microsoft Security a Leader in 5 Magic Quadrants

The Total Economic Impact™ Of Microsoft Azure IaaS

A Platform for Today, Tomorrow, and Decades from Now

Ready to learn more about what Dynamics 365 can do for your business?

Virtual Warehouses Best Practices

Warehouse data tells a story

A common setup: virtual warehouses

How virtual warehouses cause problems in the supply chain

Fixes for virtual warehouses – that actually cause more problems

The solution? Get rid of virtual warehouses

Frequently asked virtual warehouse questions

Further Reading

See how Dynamics 365 handles inventory management

Fashion Extension Certified for Microsoft Dynamics 365

Providing Enhanced Retail and Supply Chain Solutions for D365

How Sunrise 365® works with Dynamics 365

Product extensions

Sales extensions

Supply chain: where it all comes together

Sunrise 365® Retail Replenishment

In conclusion...

Access the Fashion & Apparel Certification Report

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How Frette Modernized a Heritage Brand on Dynamics 365

Unifying operations on a modern cloud platform

Automation, everywhere

The takeaway

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Apparel Roadmap

4 Steps for Successful Apparel SCM

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Give Your Business Something Better

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How Home Furnishings Brands Can Flourish in 2019

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Your Clothes Aren't One Size Fits All...and Neither Is The Cloud

Sunrise Customer Stories

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Implementing Great Ideas

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