Physical tasks shouldn’t mean everything is offline

Frexco is a startup that has to run like clockwork. When dealing with perishable products, there’s little room for error: buy too much of a product and you end up throwing it away, but not buying enough makes you run out of stock (and leaves a sour taste in the customer’s mouth).

And, of course, even perfect business intelligence can only do so much with outdated data. If something spoils or if a shipment is returned, you need that information right away.

In that regard, Frexco found itself with a problem most companies with field operations face: no software that efficiently connects field to office to provide real-time information.

Frexco’s warehouse was running on a combination of printed lists, texts and end of day counting. It wasn’t impossible to handle yet, but an expanding portfolio and growing sales meant things could start to break soon.

That’s when Frexco’s team turned to Jestor to bring their warehouse to the next level by:

1. Having real-time data, all the time;
2. Automating tasks and purchases;
3. Always knowing what happened, and why.

Automating complex processes to enable growth

Frexco understood that the only true way to scale field operations is automating data exchange. If new orders are placed, the field team has to know immediately. If a shipment is partially unusable, the office must react accordingly.

Thankfully, Jestor’s smartphone-friendliness provided Frexco with the perfect way to build internal apps and databases that did just that: team members in the field could send and receive information on-the-go.

Before Daily Excel spreadsheets manual update Every day, a new Excel file would be created and fed with start-of-the-day stock numbers, clients’ orders placed and sales projections. This would result in a list of products to buy, and the team would place these orders by manually sending WhatsApp messages to the suppliers.	After Automatic purchase forcasting Jestor always has up-to-date stock numbers and suppliers’ delivery estimates. The platform receives the clients’ orders and sales projections to generate a daily list of produce to buy, sorted by suppliers. Jestor also generates an automatic WhatsApp message for each supplier, saving the team precious time when placing orders. Those orders can also be marked as “Placed” to create a stock estimate, and “Received” to update stock numbers.
Data input using a computer in a base Warehouse team had to update the spreadsheet in periodic updates, as a separate but necessary part of the process. This update was time consuming and often inefficient, as it mainly served to digitize on-site information that was collected manually.	Collecting data anywhere through the phone Each warehouse team member has a filtered access to Jestor, allowing them to see stock data and quickly perform actions that update a product’s quantity through their smartphone, effectively allowing them to upload real-time data as they carry on their routine. This decentralized approach makes it so there’s no need to crunch numbers by the end of the day.
Print out lists Frexco’s team printed out lists with the expected product quantities to separate for delivery, and then continuously checked for new orders and compared the numbers to see if they underestimated demand.	Real time lists Jestor automatically generates a list of product quantities to separate, and updates this list whenever demand exceeds the initial expectation. This means the team members only need a quick glance at their Jestor to see if they need to separate more of a product.

TLDR: Frexco automated every manual task they could, and ensured that whatever shouldn’t be automated had a way to be registered on the spot, ensuring stock is always up-to-date.