Expansive web development to de-risk sales model
With an annual turnover of £130m, Cormar Carpets have their carpets in millions of UK homes, but needed to better connect and serve their high street resellers. Contracting out a trade only portal that showed real time stock availability and allowed on account or card ordering was their first step into eCommerce.
Here's an insight into the project development.
Project brief
Building a trade portal for a £130m manufacturer
Trade only eCommerce site
Cormar Carpets wanted to create a trade only eCommerce site that allowed all-hours ordering of products, de-risking the daytime-only customer service and sales operation.
Real time stock visibility
Carpet shops around the country needed to see the stock availability of floor coverings whilst in-store with a customer — this was key to the ongoing Cormar brand.
Widening the sales network
As the first manufacturer to move forward with such web development, Cormar Carpets aimed to increase turnover by 30% with the acquisition of 150 new carpet shops nationwide.
Project delivery
Deep planning across ordering, fulfilment and logistics
Trade only eCommerce site
Intense and extensive planning formulated the Cormar Portal for trade clients, with my project team needing to deeply understand the whole ordering and fulfilment logistics sales cycle.
Real time stock visibility
Adopting an Agile project management approach, our team focused on account security, real time API stock updates and forecasting, the order process and real time fulfilment reporting.
Outcomes
Launched to over 3,000 resellers nationwide
The Cormar Carpets Portal was launched to over 3,000 carpet resellers in the UK, many of them needing additional training, support and documentation.
Building for the future
It turned the sales model into a 24-7-365 operation, de-risking office downtime and considerably raising revenues. Cormar Carpets increased turnover from £90m to £130m over the following 4 years, thanks in part to a portal that improved customer ordering and information sharing.