SAP S/4 Retail Implementation in Central Retail at dennree Group

25th February 2022

The dennree Group is the leading bio specialist retailer in the German-speaking countries with its headquarters in Töpen in Upper Franconia. Founded in 1974, the group includes the bio specialist retailer Denns BioMarkt with over 340 locations in Germany and Austria. Around 7,400 employees contribute to the success of the group.

As a marketplace for producers, retailers and customers, dennree offers a comprehensive range of bio products with more than 14,000 articles from guaranteed ecological cultivation. The trading company supplies about 1,200 bio markets in Germany, Austria, Luxembourg and South Tyrol via its own extensive logistics system. These include the members of the BioMarkt Verbund, an association of around 500 independent bio stores and Denns BioMärkte from Germany and Austria under the common umbrella brand "BioMarkt".

With consenso as implementation partner and SAP HEC as service provider, the dennree Group reached a first very important milestone in the SAP S/4 Retail implementation in the central retail sector at the end of September 2021: more than 340 Denns BioMärkte were productively connected to the SAP solution and the first essential non-SAP systems were integrated in addition. The project involved the first-time introduction of SAP at the dennree Group and was carried out in a "greenfield" approach.
The complete integration of SAP S/4 into the dennree system landscape is planned with the shutdown of the "legacy system" Microsoft Navision in May 2022.

During the four-month rollout, the stores were converted region by region. Despite corona-related challenges, the migration and rollout of the SAP-based retail solution went smoothly.  In the run-up to the migration, it became apparent that extensive data cleansing was necessary, which is now reflected in the SAP system in a significantly increased master data quality.

The SAP implementation includes the SAP components S/4 Retail, SAP CAR, SAP PMR, SAP PO and the SAP Solution Manager. One focus was the integration of a large number of non-SAP systems at dennree. The dennree SAP Competence Centre, together with the other dennree IT colleagues (responsible for the non-SAP systems), ensures the further development and operation of the SAP solution.

By using the SAP Allocation Table (automatic calculation of the quantity to be allocated, taking into account stock, range of coverage or turnover), automatic invoice verification, the introduction of perpetual inventory and the use of SAP PMR (forecast generating suggested quantities as part of action planning), new functionalities were provided by the SAP solution for the stores. Further process optimisations are in preparation.

In addition, the joint conceptual design of dennree and consenso made it possible to develop solutions that complement the SAP standard: for example, an order and delivery plan according to dennree requirements or a fruit & vegetable cockpit that supports the specific requirements of an extremely fast-moving business

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