How Westwing Gives Quality and Data a Longer Lifetime

Challenge:
How to increase the longevity and use of quality control data throughout the organisation.
Solution:
Implementation of an intuitive digital solution with full integration to existing software systems.
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Company overview

Westwing, the leader in inspiration-based Home & Living eCommerce in Europe, was founded in 2011 by former Elle editor Delia Lachance and four co-founders. Today, the company is present in 11 European countries, and in 2021 revenues were €522 million.

Westwing is an online “curated shoppable magazine” and inspires its customers with a daily newsletter by trends, themes, stories, and brands from the world of Home & Living. The company’s mission is "To inspire and make every home a beautiful home."

In 2021, it shipped more than 4.4 million orders and sold more than 12.6 million products.

Making Data Go to Work Through Qarma

What is the best way to support rapid growth and geographic expansion? For Westwing, the answer included upgrading its quality control (QC) and assurance (QA) setups with a digital QA and QC solution.

 Westwing uses a distributed manufacturing network that provides a range of advantages, including:

  • Faster production turnarounds
  • Greater manufacturing flexibility
  • Increased supply chain resilience

However, even a carefully selected network of collaborators can have challenges – especially considering Westwing’s diverse product range.

Before instigating fundamental, digital changes to its quality setup, Westwing’s quality assurance was built around Excel sheets. Information was organised and structured in ways that made locating it time-consuming. Quality reports were saved but sometimes forgotten. Because of the company's growth using data to explore historical performance and keeping track of quality developments over time was challenging to deal with in Excel.

As a result, analysing quality performance across a growing product portfolio has been difficult. A constantly growing organisation and product portfolio also impacts the risk potential and training times for QA personnel.

“Insights and communication about quality were hard to access and had delays, and the quality of inspection work was too heavily dependent on individuals’ experience and know-how. Qarma is not a complicated IT project that requires big changes. Instead, it is a straightforward solution to address these issues –an easy to use and standardized tool enabling stability and speed in the quality assurance process,”

- Sonja Kindermann Director of Product Quality & Sustainability

Sonja Kindermann - Westwing

Making QC Data Live For Your Company

Early in the process, Westwing defined the core qualities for its QA and QC upgrades:

  • Ease-of-use: intuitive and low training times.
  • Low hardware requirements: preferably working on existing hardware, like smartphones.
  • Integrations: easy to integrate with other software solutions.
  • Informative: enabling deep insights into QA and QC developments.
  • Communicative: driving faster and more inclusive communication about QA and QC, preferably in real-time.

 Underpinning the five desired metrics was Westwing’s wish to integrate and make better use of its QA and QC data. The goal: to create a longer shelf life for QA and QC data and more precise insights.

“Quality data shall live longer and can have a greater systematic impact. This was our mantra. However, without the right tools and approach, it can be impossible to take advantage of potential insights and efficiencies buried in QA and QC data,”

- Sonja Kindermann Director of Product Quality & Sustainability

Upgrades to internal processes and Qarma's plug-and-play, CSV data capabilities, and support for multiple data formats and sources has led to many new opportunities. For example, Westwing has upgraded its information flow. Qarma's low upload speed requirements mean that quality personnel can carry out all their work on-site. Simultaneously, nuanced data analysis has increased collaboration across all parts of the supply chain and speeded up error recognition and mitigation to near real-time.

Westwing furnitures closeup

Five Lessons From Westwing’s QA Solution Integration

Westwing’s approach to integrating Qarma has been in step with how the company generally makes and follows through on initiatives:

“We take conscious decisions after fully considering the pros and cons –what opportunities, risks and consequences are attached. Then, once a decision is reached, we want to be able to run with it and fully execute it.”

- Sonja Kindermann Director of Product Quality & Sustainability

In the case of Qarma, the approach included making several core strategic decisions ahead of the rollout:

  • Avoid complications where possible: Digitisation does not equal complicated upgrades and big IT projects. Instead, find ways of embracing the "new normal" and increased digitisation that work on your terms.
  • Connect the dots: Data comes from a host of sources. Tying it all together and creating insights that lead to efficiencies is core to success.  
  • Standards and formats can do many things: QA and QC standards not only ensure that everyone is on the same page. It enables better teaching and learning experiences, to mention just one added benefit.  
  • Think of your end users and partners: Upgrades’ success depends on buy-in. Be sure to communicate the benefits to all interested parties and show, not tell, how it improves their situation. Use QA and QC software to enable partners to embrace and own quality and make continuous improvements.
  • Go all-in – in steps: Westwing switched to doing all final inspections through Qarma on day one. Since then, it has integrated Qarma throughout all QA and QC steps.

Results

Since integrating the Qarma solutions, Westwing has seen an uptick in performance across the board.

Qarma has become a central tool in Westwing’s software portfolio. The company is leveraging the easy integration with other software to increase the efficiency of solutions such as PowerBI and Zendesk.

Simultaneously, a greater shared understanding of and communication about quality runs throughout the organisation. For example, the central team in Munich can see a report the second a quality controller on the factory floor finishes it. The insights can be translated and used to make informed decisions immediately and push them out on the ground level.  

Westwing is looking to extend its use of Qarma to its warehouses and throughout its network of collaborators.

The digitisation efforts also make it easier for collaborators to see insights on product quality and be the driving force for efficiencies that cut error rates and minimise wastage.

These changes are good for them, Westwing, its customers – and the environment.