Smart recipes and seamless
inventory management - Breatec's success story with Odoo Experts
The people behind Breatec all have a background in baking. But in Nieuwkuijk in Brabant, no bread rolls off the belt. Active enzymes. With Odoo Experts we succeeded in keeping these in stock exactly under control.
“Make a dough of flour, water, yeast and salt and put it in the oven,” says Frank de Goeij, RD&A Director at Breatec. “After an hour you have farm-fresh bread. After a day you have a brick. Our bread improvers keep the bread fresh.” Breatec is a specialist in bread improvers for the bakery industry. The company is active worldwide for all bakery products you can name. The improvers consist of various components whose specific composition ensures that the product stays fresh longer, has more volume, or a finer structure, to name just a few improvements. “Enzymes are responsible for 80 percent of our daily affairs,” says Frank de Goeij. “Nothing scary. Enzymes are also in your body. They ensure that your body releases the molecules to make energy. We apply that technology in the bakery.”
Constant testing
“Every company active in the food industry works on the basis of a specific recipe,” explains Frank de Goeij. “The recipe consists of different percentages of components. The composition of those percentages is always the same and together form 100 percent. We use enzymes to make an improvement agent, but those enzymes do not always work the same way. The functioning of an enzyme varies and we have to take this into account in our recipes. Our customers want one dose, one recipe. At the back end, we therefore have to constantly test how active an enzyme is and what percentage of the other components we have to add for an optimal and standardized end product.”
Excel was the previous solution
“We used to solve that with heavy Excel sheets,” explains Frank de Goeij. “These sheets were not linked to the current stocks. So when preparing a recipe you had to take into account the current stock, in addition to selecting the products with the right activity. This task is critical to our business and makes us unique. It was necessary to organize this process more efficiently. On the one hand, we save time, but it is also fundamental because it all has to continue to go well!”
“We've been trying to get this off the ground for years, so to be able to do it now is a huge relief not only for us but for the entire Brain Group”
Absurd impact
“What we have now achieved with Odoo Experts is everything in one system, one stock management and one place to make reservations. If the stock is correct and it doesn't matter how many components the bread improver consists of, we can make the recipe in fifteen seconds to a minute. Odoo Experts' IT solution provides us with an absurd impact. We've been working for years to get this off the ground, so that we've now succeeded is a huge relief not only for us but for the entire Brain Group, the German biotech company to which we belong since last year. There is a lot of time in making recipes. It is amazing that this could be built in the Odoo ERP package. It may not sound that complicated, but it is unique that this can be done in a software package. A system that continuously monitors the stock in real time in a process in which reservations in the stock are constantly going in all directions.” “We knew it was going to be difficult,” says Erwin van der Ploeg, Senior Consultant Odoo Experts. “We succeeded through close cooperation with Breatec. They immediately realized that you cannot expect to understand everything from moment one. You have to give confidence and take a step-by-step approach together.”
Get even more out of Odoo
“I always make the example of the bicycle repairman,” says Frank de Goeij. “They can get along very well with the standard Odoo package. He takes two wheels, a saddle and frame and then he makes and sells a bicycle. In the food world we have to deal with different requirements. We have different checks that we have to do in all kinds of areas. So the recipe calculation part is fantastic, but we notice that we also miss things in Odoo if we want to house all our administration in Odoo, such as access rights and certificates for our customers. Those are the next steps we are now working on to get even more out of Odoo.”
“Odoo is not a niche package,” explains Erwin van der Ploeg. “At Odoo, 400 programmers work on the development of functionalities. With Odoo you opt for an ERP package that continues to develop strongly and you have to create the niche yourself. But then you also have it exactly the way you want it.” “Whether we have found our IT partner for life with Odoo Experts? Frank de Goeij repeats the last question. “That's what it feels like. Odoo is an ideal package to start with. It works very intuitively. See how it looks. That gives me energy without the need for an enzyme.”
Smart recipes and seamlessinventory management