Bioworld, a leading global manufacturer of pop-culture apparel and accessories, has selected Centric Software®’s Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) enterprise solution Centric 8 PLM. Centric Software provides the most innovative enterprise solutions to fashion, retail, footwear, outdoor, luxury and consumer goods companies to achieve strategic and operational digital transformation goals.
Jason Mayes, Director of Marketing and Intellectual Property says, “Bioworld is a pioneer of pop-culture products. We’ve led the way for over two decades because we look at the licensing industry differently — from the fan’s point of view. We go beyond merch, beyond commerce. We cultivate self-expression.”
Bioworld was founded in 1999. They are a global leader in licensed products, headquartered in Irving, Texas with 10 offices worldwide. Nathan Grant, VP of Creative adds, “We’re affinity amplified. By ‘affinity’ we mean fandom, and when we say ‘amplified’—this is the thing that really sets Bioworld apart within this industry—there’s no other company in our space that works across the number of product categories that we do. We cover ‘head to toe’ from hats to shirts to socks, and ‘closet to kitchen’ from throw blankets to mugs.” Indeed, Bioworld has probably licensed any brand one can think of: Star Wars, Disney, Animal Crossing, and Marvel to name a few.
It is the complexity of dealing with such a large number of products and the variety of categories across various types of retail—B2B, direct to consumer and Amazon channels—that led Bioworld to pursue PLM.
Says Grant, “We manage tens of thousands of unique products every year from a development and also from a production standpoint. We have to track progress of each product from inception to production to retail throughout the development life cycle while also managing our clients’ approvals and changes. The volume of products and approval process adds to the complexity of our operations. With all the moving parts, it seems like an impossible job!”
Patrick Flanagan, Director of IT recalls, “We went on a very long and thorough fact-finding mission, looking at multiple PLM systems over the course of two years with all the stakeholders involved. We used score cards and Centric finished head-and-shoulders above everybody else. The knowledge the Centric team has, shows us that they really understand our industry.”
Flanagan continues, “We were able to easily align our business processes with the out-of-the-box functionality of Centric PLM. Everything from design, to tech packs and building BOMs, sampling, merchandise and line planning, is a lot more efficient than before. The ‘one source of the truth’ is key.”
Grant discusses the ease of sandboxing. “It is phenomenal that if we have a challenge we can actually come up with a solution and test it in the system that same day without impacting production. We can ‘what-if’ without affecting the business.”
Bioworld had a lightning-fast PLM implementation of just 3 months. Says Grant, “We were really impressed, not only with Centric’s approach to innovation and best practices, but their ability to remotely deploy so we were able to start using Centric PLM in about a week in accordance with an urgency on our side. Under any circumstances, this would have been impressive but considering the pandemic, it was a minor miracle and a great way to start off our partnership. “
Grant concludes, “What we really want from Centric PLM is speed—and being able to bring the right products to market.”
Chris Groves, President and CEO of Centric Software says, “It is a privilege to be able to contribute to the speed-to-market and success of a company that covers so many categories, channels and beloved brands, providing quality merchandise to fans around the globe.”
