Food Distribution Supply Chain│ Software Development

Colomer & Suárez Gains Critical Business Intelligence to Grow its Food Distribution Business Well Into the Future

Wovenware supports Colomer & Suárez with a Business Intelligence tool that enables the company to gather and evaluate critical data for better forecasting and planning.

“Colomer & Suárez, a food distribution company based in Puerto Rico, realized that in order to effectively use its data enterprise-wide, it needed a solution that could integrate sales, marketing, and accounting data, track and analyze key performance indicators (KPIs), and provide real-time access to information. ”

Modernizing Solutions Together

Colomer & Suárez is a leading full-service distributor of food and consumer packaged goods, serving grocery and convenience stores in Puerto Rico. With exclusive distribution agreements with major grocery brands, such as Kraft Foods, the company is continuously growing its vendor partners. As part of its commitment to optimizing processes and implementing new technology, it sought the expertise of Wovenware to gain better visibility into its enterprise-wide data to make better business decisions.

Gaining Greater Visibility and Leveraging the Power of Data

Wovenware's collaboration with Colomer & Suárez has resulted in a data-driven approach to its operations. To develop the right solution, Wovenware leveraged the power of an Analytics Business Intelligence platform, QlikView. It also created a user-friendly web portal to streamline workflows, allowing sales representatives, account executives, managers, and administrative staff to better manage contracts and interact with vendors and other business partners.

The challenges and insights

  • Manual processes and Excel spreadsheets reduced visibility into the business and supply chain and kept data siloed in different functions.
  • It was difficult to leverage data due to inconsistent collection, delays in analysis and uncertainty about predictive models.
  • Poor vendor visibility meant missed opportunities to improve contract terms, build closer vendor relationships, or manage vendor promotions.
  • Lacked an efficient way to manage its 30 delivery staff, including when and where they delivered goods.

The Wovenware Approach

Wovenware helped the company collect and more effectively use its data enterprise-wide. It designed a Business Intelligence (BI) tool built on QlikView, to define, track and analyze key data for sales reports, estimates and other analysis, and provide management with information to evaluate expected vs. actual performance. The solution was designed to be fully compatible with the company’s AS/400 server.

Additionally, Wovenware created a web portal that provides access to all the data in real-time, creating a workflow to support different contracts, promotions and campaigns per client. Now, sales representatives, account executives, managers and administrative staff can interact with the contract -from creation to closing, while boosting performance across the supply chain.

Technologies we take advantage of