Financials and EDI Implementation for a Grocery Retailer
Clarkston Consulting recently completed a financials and Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) implementation for a grocery retailer. This grocery retailer includes more than 300 stores with $3+ billion in annual retail sales. With aging financial and reporting systems, and a homegrown EDI solution that did not allow for growth, the client sought with this latest phase in their transformation to build on their SAP systems and processes as well as engage with a reputable EDI service and solution provider to engage with all their vendors for invoicing and credits.
Soon after Thanksgiving 2020, the client achieved an inspiring milestone – implementing financials, purchasing, and EDI across their entire vendor community, taking another significant step toward having the processes, systems, and people to support their mission of serving their member stores. Clarkston helped them successfully push the latest phase of the years-long project to completion, which took place in parallel to their ongoing deployment of their master data solution to their 300 stores.
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This retailer sources a large percentage of their business from one distributor, but they also “centrally bill” over 150 other vendors who service stores directly. These vendors sell and deliver food, grocery, and consumer packaged goods to the stores, and range in size and technical sophistication. In the first month alone, they processed 155,000 inbound invoices and credits, as their entire vendor base switched over to the new system at the same time. This transformation has led to increased visibility into their vendors’ pricing, deals, charges, and allowances, providing transparency and quicker access to vital decision-making data.
In addition to EDI, the company now manages procurement of services and supplies using SAP, utilizing standard release and approval functionality, and adding structure and discipline to their procurement processes.
