RampMan® accompanies igefa on its journey to digitalisation
When four family businesses merge to form a group, as happened in 2022 with igefa SE & Co. KG, based in Neumünster, many different individual processes run in parallel. However, the B2B specialist wholesaler for sectors such as building services, industry, hotels, restaurants and catering (HoReCa) and healthcare is driving forward digitalisation within its network. This also applies to the loading ramps at 26 of our own warehouse and logistics locations in Germany, Austria, the Netherlands and Poland. For incoming goods, igefa launched a pilot project with LOGSOL in June 2025 using the web-based ramp management software RampMan® – initially at two medium-sized locations.
Pilot launch on 8,500 square metres in Lehrte
It all started with an 8,500-square-metre warehouse in Lehrte near Hanover. Every day, around 14 vehicles deliver supplies of many different items – from coffee cups to toilet paper. “The site never worked with registrations; every lorry drove up as it pleased,” reports Jörg Becker, Supply Chain Project Manager at igefa. There were regular traffic jams in and in front of the yard, and employees needed a lot of time to deal with peaks in incoming goods. Additional stress factor: By the afternoon, all delivered pallets had to be in the warehouse so that goods picked in the yard could be prepared for dispatch. A smart solution was supposed to organise ramp processes more efficiently and reduce waiting times.
RampMan® can map each location individually
Becker quickly discovers a unique selling point of LOGSOL’s RampMan®: “We were specifically looking for a single product for our ramp management, not a complete yard management system.” He was convinced by the fact that the logistics software did not involve “any burdensome costs for our carriers”. In view of the very different processes at many different locations, igefa decided on a three-month pilot phase. For Martin Mucha, Professional Project Associate at LOGSOL, this was an exciting start to the project because he had to “cleverly build the structure for a long-term, sustainable approach”. Everything had to be just right from the outset – and the experienced LOGSOL team succeeded in doing just that: “With RampMan®, we can map bottlenecks, restrictions and everything that makes each location unique.”
A few weeks after Lehrte, RampMan® was launched in Vienna – also ‘without any system integration, only as a stand-alone solution,’ reports Ann-Kathrin Dubey, Supply Chain Project Manager at igefa. Because people are always at the heart of igefa’s activities, despite digitalisation, it focused on acceptance during the test run. The manager oversaw internal and external information campaigns: “The feedback shows that not only do our employees like the tool, but freight forwarders are also using it to make bookings.” Becker gives a positive interim assessment: “Thanks to coordinated incoming goods, we have improved our delivery performance for our customers.’ At the same time, brainstorming sessions are being held with specialist departments such as Controlling in order to make use of the extensive analysis options offered by RampMan®. “Looking ahead, we hope to be able to use key performance indicators such as on-time-in-full (OTIF) for strategic purchasing in order to improve supplier performance,” says Dubey. OTIF measures how many orders were delivered on time and in full.
A large site with a 20,000-square-metre warehouse and up to 40 lorries per day is set to complete the pilot phase. After that, igefa will be able to roll out RampMan® across the board on its own.