Poppies Bakeries launches its future with spot-on ERP solution

Oct 17, 2024

operations
food
discrete manufacturing
Microsoft

If you’re into cakes, pastries and other bakery products, there’s a good chance Poppies Bakeries rings a bell. The family-owned company is closing in on its 50th anniversary and has steadily spread its wings. For perspective, it produces treats in 13 bakeries and facilities across Europe and the United States, employing over 1,300 colleagues. To maintain momentum, Poppies Bakeries is digitally transforming its business, with a new ERP solution as its showpiece.

Client: Headquartered in Belgium, Poppies Bakeries delivers bakery products to customers worldwide.
Challenge: Streamlining business processes, sharpening operational efficiency, and gearing up for sustainable growth.
Solution: Implementing a new ERP system and its accompanying way of working.

The challenge: keeping up with your own success

Poppies Bakeries’ large-scale production with artisan knowledge and quality ingredients has turned it into a go-to brand for private labels in dozens of countries. To keep up with rising demand, the company has strengthened and diversified its business through various acquisitions.

The flip side is that the rapid international growth led to a complex digital landscape. To illustrate, in 2019, Poppies Bakeries had 3 different ERP solutions. 'An ERP solution is supposed to do the heavy lifting for you, not vice versa', says Patrick Reekmans, CEO of Poppies Bakeries. 'With the outlook of an increasingly complex ICT landscape, we decided to change direction. More specifically, we looked for a digital transformation partner that could help us to say goodbye to our outdated systems and say hello to a single ERP solution, facilitating streamlined business processes across the entire group, such as an aligned supply chain. That way, we would be able to benefit even more from acquisitions, with less administrative implications.'

Improved quality control, flawless forecasting, a diversified offering, an agile business… Arguments abound to embrace a future-proof ERP solution.

Patrick Reekmans, CEO at Poppies Bakeries

The solution: a preconfigured ERP solution for the food industry

'For a company of our size and with an expanding international footprint, you quickly end up comparing the two ERP giants: Microsoft and SAP, reveals Patrick Reekmans. 'They’re the most popular for a reason and match well with our business. In other words, finding the right platform was a straightforward choice. That is, if you have a digital transformation partner by your side who can commit and deliver.'

'Inspired by their excellent reputation, we invited delaware to hear about their offering and were pleased with the options. Truth be told, at that point in the project, there were still a lot of unknown unknowns. Our instant connection with the delaware team is what cast the deciding vote. Moreover, we were drawn by their FAST-FOOD template.'

Gert Grobben, partner at delaware: 'With FAST-FOOD, we’ve developed a comprehensive ERP solution with best practices for mid-sized companies in the food industry. It’s based on the latest SAP S/4HANA, completed with delaware’s specific knowledge, experience, and templates for this sector. Because FAST-FOOD’s rich functionalities correspond well with the needs of Poppies Bakeries, only a limited set of additional developments were needed. The result: a shorter implementation process and reduced costs.'

Why Poppies Bakeries chose FAST-FOOD as blueprint for its business processes:

Large set of industry-specific building blocks, from traceability to shelf life

High levels of standardization

Always data compliant and data secure

Increased visibility (e.g. stocks) across all sites

Solid integration and connection with the outside world

VAT framework, inter-company invoicing, and product cost model

Material Requirement Planning

Focus on the food sector

Patrick Reekmans, CEO of Poppies Bakeries, shares 4 key insights for ERP projects:

#1 Don’t underestimate the impact of an effective ERP solution – a common mistake in the food industry. Do your homework and you’ll be rewarded with a powerful enabler that sets you up for sustainable growth for many years to come.

#2 Determine the scope of the process: will it strictly cover administrative aspects or operational processes as well? Additionally, pay enough attention to the master data. If you don’t get this right immediately, it will take a lot of work to catch up.

#3 Value the process. Appoint a dedicated project manager to coordinate the project at every step, from defining requirements and evaluating partners, all the way to implementing and adapting a solution.

#4 Trust the built-in best practices of your ERP solution. For example, at Poppies Bakeries, every request for customization had to be approved by the steerco. This way, we tried to make the threshold as high as possible. If not, you risk over-customizing the ERP solution and end up with what you had before.

The process: teamwork makes the ERP work

A fruitful collaboration between a company and its digital transformation partner is arguably the most essential part of any ERP project. After a successful pilot project and with integration in European and non-European production sites coming up, it’s time to make a first assessment of the Poppies Bakeries-delaware tandem.

Patrick Reekmans: 'During the project, the team at Poppies Bakeries has proven itself to be extremely agile. The fact that the company was willing to invest in a new system was met with positive reactions, as we thoroughly explained the whys and hows of the project. From the very start, we also hired two business analysts to support the ERP track (in build-and-run mode). Since then, two additional analysts have joined us, and we’re even looking for an extra one. Vice versa, delaware has confirmed they can perfectly handle the international dimension of the project. They have been very solution-oriented at all times. In short, we’ve been a good match and have the results to show for it.'

The result: ready to keep on baking joy

'Having a single ERP solution eliminates a lot of avoidable costs. For example, the costs of having to course-correct frequently, or the costs related to doing the same job twice because you didn’t know someone else was already working on the same thing. Admittedly, with SAP, things can feel bureaucratic at the start. But after a while, you realize that the solution makes it possible to monitor everything closely and intervene whenever needed. Moreover, because the solution forces you to be more process-oriented, you end up working more efficiently. I fully trust the built-in best practices, and I’m convinced that we should keep customization to a minimum.'

A glimpse at the strategic results:

Improved stock visibility
Improved margin analysis
improved customer service
Improved electronic data interchange (EDI)
Improved integration of acquisitions
Improved company culture

'In the future, we want to further improve the flow and quality of information internally, as well as reporting. Step by step, we’re reaching the digital maturity needed to accelerate our growth and keep on baking joy for many years to come.'