A building materials distributor with six branches carried wide depth for availability — but branch managers routinely over-ordered on gut feel when contractors asked "do you have it?"
The situation
SKU count exceeded 3,100 across timber, fixings, and finishing lines. Finance tracked inventory days globally; branches hid overstock in local comfort stock. Cash pressure mounted when credit lines tightened.
What ERP data showed — but didn't say
The ERP held branch transfers and sales by depot. Standard aging reports focused on receivables, not inventory cover by SKU-by-branch. No report answered how much cash could be released in 30 days without hurting fill rate.
Turning history into an action list
Flowra consolidated six years of branch movements and produced:
- 41 overstocked SKUs tying up an estimated €186,000 above target cover
- Branch-specific transfer suggestions before company-wide promos
- Stop-buy flags on lines with three consecutive months of declining velocity
Sales ran contractor bundles on the worst offenders; purchasing froze replenishment until cover normalized.
Results
- €186,000 cash released from inventory in one quarter
- Inter-branch emergency transfers down 22%
- Branch managers adopted a shared weekly action list instead of local spreadsheets