Press Release
Neustadt b. Coburg/Jena, 20 October 2020 – For the digitalisation of its retail chain Sonderpreis Baumarkt, the Franconian company FISHBULL Franz Fischer Qualitätswerkzeuge GmbH (FISHBULL) brought the Jena full-service digital agency dotSource on board. The project included the implementation of Akeneo’s product information management system. The PIM system is intended to make the use of data more efficient and to automate processes. Simultaneously with the PIM solution, dotSource was able to implement the Akeneo Onboarder at a retailer for the first time worldwide. With the Onboarder, Sonderpreis Baumarkt and its suppliers will be able to exchange product information significantly more quickly, conveniently and efficiently than before.
FISHBULL’s product range includes screws and ironmongery at favourable prices per kilo. The company now operates 270 branches and has been running the Sonderpreis Baumarkt online shop since 2014. In order to remain successful in the market, FISHBULL approached dotSource in November 2017 with the request to develop a tailor-made strategy. The goal was to expand the existing system landscape into a digital platform and to ensure the company’s long-term success – a multi-stream project in which dotSource as a full-service digital agency was able to provide all the required resources through in-house experts and to integrate them into the project for the implementation. After an intensive pre-project phase with extensive strategy consulting and in-depth workshops, the e-commerce software used was migrated to the latest version and connected to the enterprise resource planning system. Moreover, Akeneo’s PIM system was implemented to improve the internal management of product data. In order to achieve a similar increase in efficiency externally, i.e. when exchanging information with suppliers, to dissolve data silos, to make processes more efficient and also to render Excel spreadsheets redundant, FISHBULL decided to implement the Akeneo Onboarder. As the first company worldwide, Sonderpreis Baumarkt and the project team went live using this tool.
New Ways to Handle Supplier Data
With the Akeneo Onboarder, Sonderpreis Baumarkt seeks to simplify the exchange of information and data significantly and to map it centrally. The Onboarder is a cloud-based tool that makes it possible to collect product information from suppliers in a user-friendly environment and then automatically integrate it into the PIM system. dotSource implemented the software using a minimum viable product (MVP) approach and started with a pilot supplier. This approach ensures that Sonderpreis Baumarkt can collect and process feedback from actual users, i.e. suppliers and customers, and optimise the process. This sets the course for many more advantages between all user groups involved: the Onboarder eliminates not only the need for countless Excel spreadsheets, which are manually edited by several users and sent out, but also complicated e-mail traffic, different phone calls and contacts or even other channels and data storage locations that simply cause confusion.
This vision, which is currently in a promising pilot phase, will not only enormously reduce efforts, save resources and time in the future, but also significantly reduce potential sources of error. This way, Sonderpreis Baumarkt sets another milestone and meets its customers’ demands for convenient user experiences as well as its business partners’ requirements.
Automated Processes for a Digital Future and Improved Workflows
With the help of dotSource, FISHBULL has adequately transferred its former innovative business model to the Sonderpreis Baumarkt online shop. Following the implementation of the PIM system and the Akeneo Onboarder, further comprehensive measures have been taken, which FISHBULL is strongly pushing forward as it expands its platform.
Thanks to the new PIM system and the Onboarder, both internal processes and cooperation with suppliers can be made much more efficient in the future. All these subprojects show that an agile, flexible approach as well as close and trustful cooperation between stakeholder, agency and software provider lead to success. The project with Sonderpreis Baumarkt is an excellent example of how important this mindset and soft skills are, but also of how broad the portfolio of Akeneo as a software provider is.
»dotSource acts with great foresight. Whether it is strategy consulting, training or the implementation of the PIM system and its connection to the system landscape or the Onboarder: we feel perfectly supported on our journey to a digital future and learn new things with enthusiasm every day,« Marcus Kienel, responsible for digitalisation at FISHBULL, remarks.
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