The Very Group achieves £5M gains in one year with Flintfox

The Very Group is one of the largest online retailers in the UK selling over two thousand major brands in fashion, homeware, toys, and electricals.

The Solution

With the Flintfox Intelligent Pricing Platform, The Very Group the ability to analyze individual product performance. They can see in real-time where decisive pricing changes should be made. This visibility enables better pricing decision-making and has delivered significantly enhanced profit margins across key lines and categories.

The retailer manages agreements with more than 1,400 suppliers, each with individual rebate terms. In the past, this complex process was managed manually. However, with the implementation of Flintfox, the company has been able to retire 28 separate spreadsheets, moving to a single platform and delivering major efficiency gains.

On average more than 1,500 live trade agreements are managed daily through the Flintfox platform, scaling up to more than 15,000 on key days throughout the peak period. The platform consolidates all agreements and delivers a seamless process. From deal creation to invoicing, supplier transactions are processed on time and with total accuracy. Time-consuming manual claims validations are eliminated. Cashflow has improved and users are given complete visibility of both forecasted and achieved trading margins.

The Result

The Very Group has been able to transform its compliance processes to keep up with changing industry regulations. There is no longer the need for third-party services, resulting in £1 million in annual cost savings.

Chris Dieringer, Chief Customer Officer at Flintfox said: “The Very Group is a leader in the e-commerce industry with a highly sophisticated business model. But contains a lot of complexity inherent in its pricing and supplier management.”

“This is where Flintfox comes into its own. Complex pricing structures traditionally mean a lot of time and resources spent managing them. Flintfox takes that pain away, along with human errors and lost revenue. As a result, retailers and consumer brands are able to achieve total margin visibility and increased control of profits.”

The Very Group initially forecasted a saving of £ 2 million a year from moving to Flintfox. However, in year one, the platform drove an extra £5m into the business in profit.

“With the help of Flintfox, we’ve been able to completely overhaul the way we manage our pricing and supplier agreements. The holistic and granular margin visibility enables us to make in-the-moment changes to improve profitability. In addition, we can maximise supplier revenue and practically eliminate time spent debating claims. The productivity and efficiency gains have been clear and the return on investment huge.”

Phil Corner, Supplier Funding Manager, The Very Group

The Flintfox Intelligent Pricing Platform was integrated with Microsoft Dynamics 365, ensuring many of The Very Group requirements could be fulfilled out of the box. This reduced the need for heavy customization. 

Brought to you in partnership with Microsoft, view The Very Group Case Study here.