One system for the retailers, distributors and marketplaces that carry your products

Retail partners, product sheets and samples are where a growing brand runs on spreadsheets

The daily work of a consumer goods brand happens between you and your partners, which is the part rented software tends to skip.

Retailer and distributor orders arrive as emailed purchase orders, portal downloads and spreadsheets, each in its own layout, and someone retypes them, checks stock and confirms ship dates by hand.

Product data has to reach each channel in the shape it demands: different fields, image rules, case packs and descriptions for each retailer, marketplace and distributor catalog.

Samples and launches run on notes and memory: which buyer got which sample, which retailer still needs its new item forms, and whether the content is ready before the product ships.

Each of those is a small job. Together they fill the week of the people you hired to grow the brand.

One product record and one order desk can serve each partner in its own format

A unified system for a consumer goods brand holds the facts about your products and orders once, and translates them for each partner.

Each product exists once, with its specs, case pack, costs, images, approved descriptions and the extra fields particular retailers ask for. The sheet for each partner is produced from that record instead of rebuilt by hand.

Orders from each source land in one desk, whether they came by email, portal or your own site, and are checked against inventory and that account's pricing before anyone confirms them.

Your accounting system and your warehouse or fulfillment partner stay in place. The custom layer connects to them and replaces the spreadsheets that sit in between.

A retailer's purchase order should be checked against stock before anyone confirms it

The automations that matter for a brand watch two things: what your partners ask for and what changes in your own products.

When a retailer's purchase order arrives, its lines are matched to your item numbers, the ship window is compared with what you have and what is in production, and lines at risk are flagged before you confirm.

When a product detail changes, such as a new image or a revised case pack, updated sheets are prepared for each retailer and distributor that carries it.

When a buyer requests samples, the request becomes a tracked shipment with a follow-up reminder, and the outcome of the meeting is logged against the account.

When a launch date is set, the checklist builds itself: new item forms, content, samples, opening orders and marketing, each with an owner and a due date.

With partner data in one place, you can see which retail accounts are worth growing

Once orders, products and samples are tracked together, you learn things about your partners that spreadsheets hide.

You can see which retailers and distributors are profitable after promotions, deductions and freight, not just which ones order the most.

Launches become repeatable, because the checklist from the last launch becomes the template for the next, so a new product reaches shelves with less scrambling.

Sample spending becomes something you can judge, because each sample is tied to an account and to whether an order followed.

Adding a new retailer or distributor becomes a setup task rather than a new spreadsheet, which makes the next account easier to say yes to.

A brand with a handful of accounts and a simple catalog can skip custom software

If your partners are few and your products are simple, rented tools will serve you well and cost far less.

If you sell through a handful of retailers who reorder a few times a year, a shared inbox and a careful spreadsheet may honestly be enough for now.

Brands that already run on a large enterprise system may get more from setting it up properly than from building beside it.

Custom earns its keep in the middle: a brand with several retail and distribution partners, a growing catalog, and a team spending its days reformatting data and retyping orders.

Begin with the order desk or the product record, whichever eats more of your week

A brand's first project should be the partner workflow that takes the most staff time, built well enough to become the base for the rest.

If purchase orders are the bottleneck, start with the order desk. If retailer setup and product sheets are, start with the product record.

Samples, launch checklists and partner reporting can be added later on the same data, so the system grows as you add accounts.

Projects start at $10,000. Talk to us about the partner that creates the most work for your team, and we will map what a first version would handle.