Streamlining and Standardizing Export Operations with the Trade Management System 'TRADING'

Sunplan Soft Co., Ltd. (Headquarters: Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture), a company that develops systems specializing in the trade domain, has provided its TRADING trade management system to Akachan Honpo Co., Ltd. (Headquarters: Osaka, Osaka Prefecture), a specialty store for maternity, baby, and kids' products.

Akachan Honpo, which faced challenges with the burden of creating shipping documents for exports to Taiwan and a situation dependent on specific personnel, has achieved de-personalization and standardization of its export operations by introducing TRADING. The time required to create shipping documents has been reduced to one-fifth of what it was previously.

1. Background: The Burden and Personalization of Creating Shipping Documents with Excel

Previously, shipping documents such as INVOICEs and PACKING LISTs were created using Excel. However, due to the large number of SKUs and the vast number of line items, a significant amount of time was required for data transcription and entry, leading to careless mistakes. The need for corrections and re-creation added to the workload, and a situation persisted where creating accurate documents required enormous effort, making operational efficiency and error reduction urgent tasks.
Furthermore, since one person was in charge of export operations, the creation of shipping documents became personalized, and the business process was dependent on a specific employee. With the continuous increase in the number of stores, products, and SKUs for exports to Taiwan, it became difficult to guarantee document quality during handovers each time a person in charge changed, and the conventional system had reached its limits. With the introduction of this trade management system, the company aimed to achieve both operational efficiency and standardization.

[Background for Introduction]

• The burden of creating shipping documents with Excel and the occurrence of human error

• Breaking away from a dependency structure caused by personalization of tasks

• Building a standardized system that can accommodate changes in personnel

2. Reasons for Choosing Sunplan Soft and 'TRADING': Proposals Understanding the Industry and a Flexible Package

TRADING was highly evaluated not only for being a package that covers all the necessary functions for trade operations but also for its ability to be flexibly customized. We could envision realizing our requests, such as maintaining data for overseas shipments and batch-generating all shipping documents automatically. We determined that this system could resolve our issues of personalization, human error, and inefficiency.
Moreover, the sales and SE staff, who are well-versed in trade operations, rarely said 'we can't do it,' and their thorough support gave us a sense of trust. We believed that the handling in the upstream stages would directly impact subsequent operation and deployment, so we decided we could confidently entrust them with everything from requirements definition to testing and post-launch. We are also satisfied with their quick response times to inquiries.

3. Effects of Introducing 'TRADING': De-personalization of Export Operations, Efficiency in Shipping Document Creation, and Quality Assurance

Achieving De-personalization and a System Ready for Business Expansion and Personnel Changes

The introduction of TRADING has eliminated the dependency on specific employees. The implementation has standardized operations, and a system is now in place where the contents of shipping documents can be easily shared and saved in a database. Its intuitive operation is also a plus, and we have built a mechanism that can quickly respond to future personnel changes and overseas business expansion. Being a cloud-based service, the lack of server maintenance also contributes to reducing the operational load.

Reducing Shipping Document Creation Time to One-Fifth

We can now import CSV data for overseas shipments, such as product, shipment, and pallet information, into TRADING and automatically generate shipping documents like INVOICE, PACKING LIST, and C/No. in a batch. Previously, it took about 25 hours for pre-creation preparation, document creation, and confirmation, but this has been shortened to about 5 hours, allowing the document creation process to be completed within normal business hours. Since the processing time remains almost unchanged even if the number of product SKUs exceeds 1,000, we can fully accommodate future business expansion.

Ensuring Document Quality and Strengthening Internal Controls

With the previous manual work in Excel, human errors such as misidentifying products with different component ratios or document discrepancies due to a single line copy omission occurred frequently. The introduction of TRADING has eliminated such mistakes and reduced the time spent on checks. The accuracy of official documents submitted to public bodies like customs has improved, and a system is in place to maintain the same level of quality even if the person in charge changes, preventing the risk of quality degradation due to dependency on a specific employee.

4. About the Trade Management System 'TRADING'

The trade management system TRADING is a cloud-based package software that unifies operations related to import/export, export, import, and domestic sales management, realizing the standardization and efficiency of trade operations.

TRADING offers five product lineups to choose from according to the customer's business content and requirements.

[Sunplan Soft's Strengths]

• A rich track record of over 2,000 installations, from large corporations to small and medium-sized enterprises

• Five packages to choose from according to the customer's business content and application

• Sales and SE staff with extensive specialized knowledge and over 30 years of experience in the trade domain

[TRADING's Strengths]

• Efficiently create export documents with a high degree of freedom

• Realize accurate cost management by apportioning import expenses

• Supports foreign currency-denominated receivables/payables, forward exchange contracts, and exchange gains/losses

[TRADING Series]

• TRADING-SD (Import/Export Operations + Domestic Sales Management System)

• TRADIND-EX (Export Management System)

• TRADING-EL (Export Document Creation System) ERP Linkage Output

• TRADING-IS (Import Operations + Domestic Sales Management System)

• TRADING-IM (Import Management System)

[Challenges Solved by TRADING]

• Elimination of personalization in trade operations

• Overall efficiency improvement for import/export, export, and import operations

• Strengthening of internal controls through business standardization

• Elimination of dual management between existing systems and Excel

• Reduction of server maintenance and cost burdens through cloud provision

5. Company Overview

Company Name: Sunplan Soft Co., Ltd.

Location: 6F TPB Building, 1-18-9 Sakae, Naka-ku, Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture

URL: https://www.sunplan.co.jp/

Business Content: Development and provision of trade management systems
- Import/Export Sales Management System

- Export Management System

- Import Management System

6. Contact Information

Sunplan Soft Co., Ltd. Sales Department

TEL: 052-228-3884

Email: sales_marketing@sunplan.co.jp