Velocity Restorations, a leader in high-end vehicle restoration, specializes in classic Ford Broncos, F-100s, and Chevy C10s. Their 14-week assembly process and four full production lines running simultaneously mean managing thousands of parts across 7,000-8,000 SKUs valued at $4.5 million.  

However, inefficiencies in manual scheduling, inventory tracking, and midstream order changes were creating operational roadblocks. To improve workflow efficiency and reduce the labor-intensive workload, the company turned to Fishbowl Advanced for a more automated, scalable solution. 

Challenge 

Before Fishbowl, Velocity Restorations faced major inefficiencies in scheduling and inventory management that significantly impacted their production workflow. The company managed multi-level BOMs (Bills of Material), requiring extensive manual entry to schedule and track each component’s availability across their 32 concurrent builds. When a customer changed a configuration midstream—such as upgrading from a four-point to a six-point roll cage—it required manually updating multiple workstations, leading to costly delays. 

The team struggled with a lack of real-time inventory visibility, making it difficult to track obsolete or slow-moving stock, contributing to unnecessary inventory costs. “It took hours to days to adjust our scheduling whenever a change was made, which slowed us down,” said a Velocity Restorations team member.  

They also had no structured shortage reporting, leaving assembly teams unaware of material constraints until it was too late. The company needed an automated solution to improve efficiency, reduce manual data entry, and optimize inventory control. 

Solution 

To streamline production, they implemented Fishbowl Advanced. This enabled them to automate scheduling, enhance visibility, and improve work order accuracy. Fishbowl’s automated scheduling allowed BOM updates to apply across multiple levels, preventing hours of redundant manual entry whenever modifications were made.  

For inventory tracking, custom reports (including a BOM vs. Actual Consumption Report) were implemented to highlight discrepancies between planned and actual material usage. Fishbowl’s Turnover and Aging Reports provided a clearer view of obsolete and slow-moving inventory, allowing for more strategic inventory decisions. The shortage reporting system was also improved, giving the assembly team weekly visibility into missing parts before they caused production slowdowns. 

Additionally, custom cycle count reports were deployed to improve inventory reconciliation, ensuring stock levels matched real-time demand.  

“With Fishbowl, we finally have accurate data on what’s moving and what’s not. We can reduce overstock and keep production running smoothly. We used to dump 16 reports into five different spreadsheets just to get the data that Fishbowl now does in one click.” Jonathon Rhynd, Supply Chain Systems Manager 

Results 

Since implementing Fishbowl, Velocity Restorations has significantly improved its scheduling, inventory visibility, and production workflows, helping the team to focus on scaling operations rather than manually fixing bottlenecks. 

  • Scheduling time reduced by 50%: Automated cascading BOM updates eliminated hours of data entry per vehicle, improving production speed and reducing scheduling errors. 
  • Real-time inventory tracking led to better stock control: By leveraging Turnover and Aging Reports, the company identified and addressed slow-moving stock, optimizing purchasing and reducing inventory waste. 
  • Faster, more accurate BOM updates: The ability to apply BOM changes to issued work orders without manual data entry allowed for seamless midstream adjustments. 
  • Improved shortage reporting and procurement planning: Weekly shortage reports provided the assembly team with insights into upcoming stock constraints before they impacted production. 
  • Greater financial insights into manufacturing costs: By tracking actual material consumption vs. planned BOM usage, the company reduced cost variances and improved forecasting. 

“Fishbowl gives us the visibility we never had before. We can see shortages ahead of time and fix problems before they impact production.” Jonathon Rhynd, Supply Chain Systems Manager 

With Fishbowl’s automated solutions, Velocity Restorations has streamlined its previously time-intensive processes, increased production efficiency, and optimized inventory control. The company continues to leverage Fishbowl’s tools for scalability and future growth.