A foodservice wholesaler with chilled and ambient depots fought daily stockouts on a rotating set of SKUs — while slow lines still consumed rack space and working capital.
The situation
Demand spiked on Mondays and before holidays. Buyers used minimum stock levels set years ago. The ERP suggested reorders; it did not prioritize them against real cover once backorders and in-transit quantities were considered.
What ERP data showed — but didn't say
Historical shipments showed which items actually drove revenue and which merely looked busy because of bundle picks. The gap between system on-hand and sellable cover was visible only after merging movement velocity with open PO data.
Turning history into an action list
Flowra ingested three years of exports plus weekly stock snapshots. Outputs included:
- A 14-day stockout watchlist ranked by revenue at risk
- Recommended order quantities adjusted for case packs and MOQ
- Ambient vs chilled splits so receiving docks were not overloaded
Morning ops reviews started from the watchlist — not from every ERP exception flag.
Results
- Stockouts on A-velocity lines down 31% in eight weeks
- Spoilage-related write-offs down 12% after deprioritizing over-ordered chilled lines
- Buyer overtime on emergency POs reduced by roughly one full day per week