Knifestock is a multi-channel e-commerce retailer operating across online, marketplace, B2B, and physical store channels in 8 or more European markets, managing thousands of SKUs across 4 sales channels. The core challenge was balancing inventory across that complexity: too much capital tied up in slow-moving stock, too little visibility to prevent lost sales, and no systematic basis for replenishment decisions beyond intuition and historical patterns. Manual decision-making prevented management from seeing which positions were tying up capital across multiple countries simultaneously. Onetribe integrated ERP Pohoda and the RSHOP e-commerce platform, built a real-time multi-channel view at product, channel, and country level, implemented dynamic optimal quantity calculations, and automated identification of SKUs requiring replenishment alongside detection of slow-moving positions. The system identified a product category with significantly excessive inventory tied up for 4 to 6 months of sales across several markets; a coordinated discount strategy was executed to free that capital and reallocate it to fast-rotating SKUs. Results: meaningful cash flow improvement from freed inventory capital; management shifted from reactive to proactive inventory decisions; automated real-time evaluation of every SKU replaced manual processes; and the infrastructure scales to new markets through configuration rather than system changes.
Context
- Multi-channel e-commerce retailer operating across online, marketplace, B2B, and physical stores
- 8+ European markets with planned rapid expansion
- Thousands of SKUs across 4 sales channels
- Contacted Onetribe based on reference from Stahlmann
- Used ERP Pohoda and e-shop platform RSHOP by RIESENIA
Challenge
- Multi-market expansion required sophisticated inventory management across thousands of SKUs and 4 channels in 8 countries
- Balancing inventory levels critical: too much inventory ties up capital, too little causes lost sales
- Achieving optimal balance became competitive advantage requirement
- Manual decision-making about inventory replenishment based on intuition and historical patterns
- Unclear view of capital tied up in inventory
- Multi-market planning difficult without integrated analytics
- Need for real-time automated solution for inventory decisions
What Was Implemented
- Direct integration of ERP Pohoda with RSHOP e-commerce platform and additional systems
- Multi-channel view across online, marketplace, B2B, and retail channels
- Real-time profitability tracking at product, channel, and country levels
- Real-time analysis of every SKU including current inventory vs. sales trends
- Dynamically calculated optimal inventory quantities
- Automatic identification of SKUs requiring replenishment
- Detection of slow-moving positions tying up capital
- Scalable infrastructure supporting addition of new markets through configuration rather than system changes
Outcomes
- System identified product category with significantly excessive inventory in several countries with capital tied up for 4-6 months of sales
- Coordinated discount strategy implemented on selected SKUs across markets
- Resources freed from inefficient inventory positions
- Capital reallocated to fast-rotating SKUs
- Support for expansion into new markets
- Cash flow impact described as significantly positive
- Management transitioned from reactive to proactive inventory management
- Automated evaluation of every SKU in real-time replacing manual processes
- Real-time view across 8+ markets and all channels