From Excel and paper to a single system: how AJ Desserts got its growth under control
What happens when your company grows faster than your systems? AJ Desserts produces rice pudding and desserts for supermarkets, wholesalers and smaller customers. Until recently, everything there ran on Excel lists, paper production sheets and a separate accounting package. AJ Desserts uses its own drivers to deliver all the way into the store. On top of that, part of the operation existed only in the heads of a few key people, so whenever they were absent, business continuity came under pressure. The solution was an ERP system and an IT partner that would support the processes, provide real-time insight and grow with the business. horsum guided the project as an independent partner, from process analysis to ERP selection. Read how AJ Desserts is now live with Odoo.
Processes first, then the system
At horsum, an ERP selection doesn’t start with a demo but with a thorough business assessment. Through interviews and workshops, we mapped AJ Desserts’ entire operation using end-to-end tracks: order-to-cash, purchase-to-pay, production, quality, warehouse and finance. This shows at a glance what happens across departments, from price request to payment and from raw material to delivery in the store.
Why did you choose to examine your processes first, before starting the search for a new ERP system?
“By mapping the processes together with our employees, we made implicit knowledge explicit. What used to exist only in the heads of a few key people became a shared frame of reference for the whole organisation. It also immediately formed the basis for the functional requirements of the new ERP system.”
From bottlenecks to opportunities
Each bottleneck was given a concrete path to improvement:
- Sales: prices per customer group with validity dates, quotations that become sales orders in a single click, and invoices generated automatically from the delivery note.
- Production and warehouse: stock used to be counted by hand every day and recorded on paper, and there was no real production planning. Now recipes, production steps and stock levels are all in the system. As a result, nothing is produced without sufficient raw materials, and nothing is produced too late.
Food safety and traceability: not an extra, but a basic requirement
For a food producer, quality and traceability are essential. At AJ Desserts, this monitoring was mainly done in Excel, which meant a lot of manual work.
Which insights from the workshops did you find most surprising or valuable?
“Together, we worked out how to make lot tracing watertight, from the receipt of raw materials to delivery to the customer. This includes a refined production lot number, recording consumption on the production order, and quality checks with minimum and maximum values that trigger an alert when there are deviations. Supplier certificates and their expiry dates now also have a fixed place in the system.” – Jo Adriaenssens
Looking beyond the ERP
Not every challenge can be solved with an ERP, so we looked at the entire future IT landscape. One example: drivers used to fill in delivery notes by hand, and the office staff then re-entered everything into Excel and the invoicing program. With a mobile app for digital delivery notes, that data now flows straight into the ERP and immediately serves as the basis for invoicing.
We also explored several focus topics in more depth: route optimisation, BI reporting, EDI, automated processing of bank and payroll data (CODA/SODA) and automated processing of purchase invoices (Peppol/OCR). For each topic, we openly laid out the pros and cons, such as cost and complexity. AJ Desserts then set its own priorities.
A choice based on substance, not sales talk
With the processes and functional requirements documented, the selection could start in a targeted way. We drew up a longlist of ERP solutions and IT partners, with a focus on:
- Experience in the food industry
- Support for production, quality and traceability
- Ease of use on the shop floor
From that longlist came a shortlist. Each candidate received a tailored Request for Proposal (RFP), and the demos followed scenarios taken from AJ Desserts’ own day-to-day operations.
How did horsum help you choose a new ERP system and IT partner?
“As an independent partner, horsum made sure that every supplier was assessed against the same criteria and that promises made during demos were tested against our actual needs. As a result, the choice was based on substance, not on who gave the best sales pitch.” – Jo Adriaenssens
Live with Odoo
AJ Desserts had a clear picture of its own processes, an improvement plan with broad support and a well-considered choice. With all of that in place, the company started the implementation with confidence. Today, it is live with Odoo. One central system has replaced the scattered Excel lists and paper documents.
How do you experience the difference now that Odoo is in use? What has it delivered for you in concrete terms?
“It’s a completely new way of working. It makes many processes simpler and, above all, takes away a lot of administrative work. The road to get here was long and intensive, with a great deal of consultation, communication and brainstorming. A few things still need fine-tuning here and there, but fortunately Odoo is very flexible in that respect and allows customisation. After all, no two organisations work exactly the same way, and a small SME in particular often has very specific needs and ways of working.” – Jo Adriaenssens
Where did horsum make the difference for you during the project?
“If we had started this search on our own, I think we would have given up fairly quickly. For years we had worked with our own ‘system’, which had grown organically over time, and a lot of the knowledge sat with just a few people.
When you then have to look for a suitable ERP package as a layperson, you’re quickly overwhelmed by terms and options. They aren’t always easy to understand, and they’re often hard to translate into your own specific needs.
horsum guided us by critically questioning how we work and getting to the heart of things with very targeted questions. They raised topics that we really had to think through ourselves: how do we want to organise this as efficiently as possible in the future, without overlooking anything important?
Thanks to their direct and expert guidance, we got a much clearer picture of our needs and of the solutions that fit them. They were on the ball, to the point and extremely valuable in what was largely new territory for us.” – Jo Adriaenssens
Sound familiar? Let’s talk.
Do your operations still run on Excel lists and paper? Or are you unsure which ERP system best fits your processes? As an independent partner, we guide you from process analysis and ERP selection through to implementation and post-go-live support. That way, you make a choice that works today and is ready for the future.
