Floral / Live goods Distribution App
Tech Stack
AWS EC2
ReactJS
Python / Django
PostgreSQL
About
Our client has been supplying and managing big-box store garden centers throughout Ontario for over 30 years. They are responsible for establishing contracts with greenhouse vendors. This entails booking floral items such as hanging baskets, planters, bedding plants for the upcoming Spring season. Once Spring arrives, our client then dispatches staff to various store locations to manage day-to-day operations of their garden center along with logging inventory and ordering product 48 hours in advance.
Objectives
To aid in our client’s growth they needed a centralized data solution. They were also using an older business process that involved managers and office admins contacting each other via telephone to place orders for that manager's store location. The office admins would also receive from vendors via email products that they had available for that day. The office admins would take both pieces of data and would then fill out a single excel sheet and email the file out to their vendors for fulfillment. This process was overly time-consuming and prone to human error.
Challenges
Our client required a solution that would allow the following:
Login ( No registration, users would be created by office admins )
Store profile information
Assign users to various roles & distributors (ie. a store manager may manage 2 locations)
Vendor-attached users to post inventory available in 48 hours
Store-attached users to post inventory on-hand and request items to be delivered in 48 hours
Office admins to view data submitted from vendors and stores and then dispatch products to the stores
Export purchase orders to .csv for QB importing
Report empty racks at stores ready to be picked up by vendor
Easy reporting
Our Strategy
We began by working closely with the office admin staff, collecting any forms they were currently using to understand what data was being collected. Over a few days, we were taken through their business process to identify deficiencies and how we could improve upon them. We would also bring in select vendors and store-management staff to understand the business process from their end as well. Collecting this information was vital to ensuring our end-product was exactly what all parties involved required.
With the information collected, we began working simultaneously on the database & UX design. As often happens, the two tasks become intertwined and dependent on each other. We started with our database in its unnormalized form then began working on initial concepts and components. As we began designing the prototype we would go back and make alterations to the database. Rinse, repeat; until it was just right.
Our approach for the design of the project was web-first. With 3 end-user interactions to cater to (office admins, vendors, store managers), the majority would be utilizing the system on their laptop or computer devices rather than mobile. Once that design was completed, we then went on to produce a responsive mobile web design.
Results
We created the distribution management system web app! This enabled middle-man operations to collect products readily available from vendors within their network and create purchase orders to be sent to various store locations.
With scalability and integration in mind, we created a back-end REST API with JWT authentication & authorization. Our demographic user-base was vast. The front-end had to be constructed to be clear and concise so no user felt overwhelmed or lost when using the DMS. Our responsive mobile web design also ensured store managers, who didn't have access to a computer, were able to pull out their smartphones and input their order information to receive products. Managers who managed multiple locations were also given the ability to switch between locations and create orders seamlessly.
Our client recognized our excellence in innovation and execution, strengthening their trust in us to keep building on an already excellent platform.