REWE Case Study: Connecting Outlook and SharePoint

Challenge

• Productivity loss caused by manual steps when saving emails to SharePoint
• Low user acceptance due to cumbersome workflows
• High control effort because metadata needs to be maintained afterward

Solution

• Intuitive Outlook add-in that links SharePoint seamlessly with Outlook
• Drag-and-drop functionality for filing and transferring data
• Metadata prompts already during the upload process
• High-quality previews for emails and documents

Business Value

• Minimal training effort for end users
• High SharePoint adoption thanks to the simple O2S experience
• Accelerated, document-centric processes across departments

The REWE Group has relied on SharePoint for years to support enterprise document management. The gap between Outlook and SharePoint remained a pain point because emails and attachments had to be stored locally before upload. In 2007 REWE launched a market evaluation, built prototypes, and assessed the Office 2 SharePoint (O2S) Outlook add-in. O2S has now been in place for more than a decade and closes the last mile between email and document filing.

O2S bridges SharePoint and Outlook

The add-in is used across all corporate headquarters departments and serves more than 3,500 daily users. Without O2S, staff must store messages locally before moving them into the right SharePoint library. With the plug-in, emails and attachments are dragged directly into the O2S menu and land in the correct SharePoint library immediately. Metadata is captured in the same step. Bernadette Griessler, IT Organiser for portal systems, notes: “The seamless filing and easy metadata entry make O2S a well-accepted tool in our headquarters.”

Transfer emails, files, and folders via drag-and-drop

O2S moves complete folder structures via drag-and-drop. In the current release, O2S integrates with SharePoint as tightly as Exchange with Outlook. When a message opens in SharePoint, users enjoy the same capabilities they would expect inside Outlook, eliminating media breaks.

Minimal training required

O2S meets enterprise demands for configuration and administration. Many defaults are applied during installation, so users rarely need to adjust settings. Employees link their relevant SharePoint areas once inside O2S, and the connections remain available. The intuitive experience keeps training needs low and can be covered with a short eLearning module plus video tutorials.

About the REWE Group

Founded in Cologne in 1927, the cooperative REWE Group is one of Europe’s leading retail and tourism companies. Around 345,000 employees work across 21 European countries in more than 15,000 stores. In 2017 the group generated external revenue of EUR 58 billion. Its international business is bundled under REWE International in Austria.

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