With around 3,500 stores, dm-drogerie markt GmbH+Co. KG is the largest drugstore group in Europe, according to the company. The company has grown since the first store was founded in 1973. In the process, the retail chain has overcome many a hurdle. This is because the retail sector has changed significantly in the past decade: Customer needs have become increasingly diverse, primarily due to the boom in online retail. The drugstore chain had to adapt its store concept accordingly. Stricter environmental regulations also resulted in the need to operate sustainably. Expansion and growth also required a new bundling of services. The targeted outsourcing of store logistics to long-standing partner Simon Hegele made an important contribution to the expansion of the store network.

Keeping an eye on the supply chain
In 1998, the logistics service provider initially began storing IT components for the drugstore chain. The company has now been supporting dm for over 20 years. At the heart of the collaboration is customer-specific lifecycle management. In this way, the logistics provider is firmly anchored in its customer's value chain and manages all the work involved in equipping around 2,000 dm stores - from measuring, planning and installation to servicing with spare parts and repairs. Simon Hegele supports its retail customer in optimizing the supply chain from five logistics locations.

Store facelift with 3D scanning technology
As part of the collaboration, Simon Hegele is developing numerous new services, for example when redesigning the store design of all stores to mark dm's 40th anniversary: as up-to-date CAD plans did not exist for every store, the logistics service provider used the "3D Plan & Scan" process to capture every dm store using 3D laser scanners. Based on the data obtained in this way, Simon Hegele created the corresponding CAD plans, which digitally depict the geometric model of the store areas.
Various divisions of the drugstore chain are now using the plans to draw important conclusions for optimizing the overall process. Process costs have also already been saved in this way. "3D Scan & Plan" has thus established itself at dm. Since the successful implementation of this service, all new stores are now scanned during shell construction and after completion. As a full-service partner, Simon Hegele manages and carries out all steps in the process chain, from order processing, shell scanning and CAD plan creation through to the handover of the premises.

Flexible thanks to IT and expert pools
A large number of digital applications are also part of the overall concept. For dm, for example, Simon Hegele developed a tablet solution that was used extensively to control the technicians as well as for transportation, installation and assembly. "We want to react flexibly to the needs of our customers. That's why we also have pools of experts for various services and products. After all, a large number of specialists such as architects, CAD draughtsmen, technicians, logistics experts and professional drivers are needed to carry out all process steps," explains Managing Partner Stefan Ulrich.

About the Simon Hegele Group
Founded in 1920 with one wagon and two horses, the logistics service provider now has 49 locations worldwide, 2,500 employees and 600,000 square meters of logistics and service space. Today, the company offers services in the areas of procurement logistics, production logistics, packaging and spare parts logistics, reverse logistics, supply chain security management and various value-added services.