Distributors sit in the middle of the supply chain, providing a connection between manufacturers and, ultimately, consumers. They must track products and terms for multiple suppliers and multiple customers, including such diverse things as economic order quantities and cooperative advertising dollars, for both suppliers and customers.
The complexity in the business is mirrored by the complexity in its supporting enterprise software vendors, as evidenced by the almost 100 different available wholesale distributor software options on the market. We wrote this buyer’s guide to help buyers better understand what to look for when assessing distribution software reviews in this market.
Here’s what we’ll cover:
What is Distribution Software?
Application Categories
What Type of Buyer Are You?
Market Trends You Should Understand
Recent News
Benefits & Potential Issues
What is Distribution Software?
Distribution software covers the systems used to run operations, including accounting, inventory management, customer relationship management, order management, purchasing, warehouse management, and front counter operations. While small operations can use generic accounting and inventory management systems, distributors and distribution centers (DCs) require the special functions available in distribution management systems.
Application Categories
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Front counter operations |
Automates the point of sale if the distributor does pick up sales for wholesale or even retail. Functions include order processing, tax calculations, receipt printing. Interfaces with inventory and customer relationship systems. Example vendors include Microsoft, Counterpro, and Activant. |
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Customer management |
Used to maintain customer contact information, preferences, reorder points, and credit information. Functions include generating mailing lists, maintaining sales history, and tracking co-op sales. Example vendors include SAP, Oracle, and SugarCRM. |
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Order management |
Prepares bids, prepares quotes, and processes customers orders. Functions include quote to order, preparing shipping information, creating return materials authorizations. Example vendors include SAP, NetSuite, and Microsoft. |
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Purchasing & procurement |
Used to order inventory and track discounts offered. Functions include preparing purchase orders, tracking economic order quantities, and preparing receiving reports. Example vendors include Gilliani, Geneva, and Microsoft. |
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Inventory management |
Used to count, track, receive, and locate parts and materials. Functions include tracking assets, processing advance notifications, tracking inventory value, and tracking reorder points. Example vendors include Sage, Epicor, and Oracle. |
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Warehouse management |
Tracks the quantity and stock of inventory items within the warehouse. Warehouse distribution management functions include slotting analysis, preparing pick information, and location tracking. Examples vendors include Royal4, S2K, HighJump, and Geneva. |
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Distribution accounting |
Automates the general ledger, accounts receivable, accounts payable, and other accounting functions with special emphasis on the unique requirements of distributors. Functions include keeping ledger balances, tracking client debt, and calculating available discounts. Example vendors include SAP, Oracle, Microsoft, and Intuit. |
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Demand management |
Used to adjust inventory levels according to fluctuations in the demand forecast to ensure that supply coordinates with demand. It will include functionality to track customer delivery schedules, manage customer rebates, and process order returns. Example vendors include SAP, Epicor, and NetSuite Distribution. |
What Type of Buyer Are You?
Before evaluating distributor software, you’ll need to determine what type of buyer you are. Over 90% of buyers fall into one of these four groups:
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Full-suite buyer. These buyers value the seamless integration of data and processes that comes from having one system for all functions. For example, a full-suite system for accounting, customer relationship management and inventory management can turn quotes automatically into orders and then generate picking lists, shipping labels, and invoices. These buyers favor complete distribution management software suites like Oracle, SAP, Sage ERP or Microsoft Dynamics AX.
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Multiple warehouse operations buyer. These buyers run multiple facilities and need to track and balance inventories over a geographical area. The buyers require software that can balance inventory between warehouses while strategically placing it closest to the probable customers. The system must give both overall enterprise data as well as breaking down each operation. It must track customer and vendor accounts, and make sure customer accounts are consolidated even if the customer orders from different locations.
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Departmental buyer. These buyers are specialists for firms that have an internal distribution network. They may only sell to their own outlets, but they must contend with multiple suppliers, inventory issues, competing corporate customers, and transportation decisions similar to commercial distributors use. As such, they should evaluate software for wholesale distribution companies that can support multiple departments.
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Small business buyer. These buyers may work for distributors or wholesalers or may have a distribution component as part of their business. They usually have smaller numbers of clients, suppliers, and inventory and may include some assembly or production components but still face the same basic issues as large-scale distributors. These buyers are often using paper-based systems or general accounting systems wholesale distribution software small business distributors typically use like Intuit or Peachtree.
Market Trends You Should Understand
In the age of on-demand, custom-built products; overnight shipping; and Internet disintermediation, the distribution sector is under pressure to reestablish its value proposition and increase efficiency. One of the ways distributors can do this is by utilizing advanced features included in software for distribution business needs.
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Total logistics cost modeling. Traditionally, inventory was costed by adding its unit cost to its shipping cost. Total logistics cost (TLC) looks at all expenses related to acquiring, transporting, and storing inventory. This includes things such as labor costs, the amount of shelf space required, and even allocated overhead costs. For example, if two items cost the same and weigh the same, but one is much larger than the other, the larger item will require more storage space and will have a higher TLC.
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Pick to light technology. Pick to light (PTL) is a paperless picking technology. Instead of printing a pick list, arrays of lights on the ceiling and shelving indicate the location of the items to be picked. Digital displays on the shelf give the quantity to pick. PTL is incorporated into warehouse management or inventory management software and can reduce operations costs in the warehouse.
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Intelligent inventory tagging. The use of one-dimensional bar coding for equipment and inventory tagging is well established in manufacturing systems. Recent systems use radio frequency identification (RFID), which can be read remotely to check inventory levels and to confirm equipment availability. Other systems use two dimensional bar codes which contain descriptive information in addition to an identifier like a part number.
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Advanced slotting analysis. Advanced slotting analysis uses historical inventory information, picking trends, and warehouse shelving layout information to determine the most cost-effective placement of inventory in the warehouse. Slotting analysis can also ensure that dangerous items are not stored together, for example, ammonia next to chlorine, which could violate government regulations, insurance restrictions, and common sense.
Recent News
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Epicor and Activant Acquired - A major acquisition in the wholesale business software market took place last year when private equity firm Apex Partners acquired (and merged) Epicor and Activant. The merger brought Activant under the Epicor umbrella and expanded Epicor’s offerings to small and medium-sized distributors. Companies looking for a distribution software solution will now be able to work their way into deals with Epicor, one of the major ERP vendors on the market today.
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Exact - Exact recently rewrote their distribution solution, Exact Macola, for the Cloud to provide small and medium-sized distributors with on-demand access to their data. The update was a major change to the product, which has been available as an on-premise solution for more than two decades. The release of Exact Macola On Demand coincided with new mobile functionality that allows distributors to monitor inventory, financials and more from any Internet-enabled device.
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Fishbowl - In 2012, Fishbowl released several updates to their distribution software for small business. For instance, Fishbowl added product alerts to their Sales Order module, which is designed to tell salespeople the timeframe for fulfilling a particular sales order. Fishbowl also updated their search functionality to make it easier to find requested parts in the system and in the warehouse.
Benefits & Potential Issues
As distributors feel pressures from increasing demands to restock as the economy recovers and to reassert value in the supply chain, they need concrete benefits to justify system expenses.
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Lower total logistics cost. Since distribution management systems let managers get a more realistic view of inventory costs, they can take steps to increase the overall costs. For example, it might be more cost effective to buy a slightly more expensive product that has better packaging that takes substantially less shelf space.
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Increased profitability. Combining information from TLC analysis and slotting analysis, objects that are picked together often, can be shelved next to each other. This reduces the overall labor involved in picking, although the costs for each individual item is constant.
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Improved customer service. In addition to fulfilling orders more quickly and accurately, inventory systems work with customer relationship management and order management systems to project customer’s needs, notifying representatives to contact customers with suggested orders and recommending related goods. Ideally, your distribution business software interfaces directly with the customer’s order system allowing orders to be placed and processed automatically.
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Improved vendor relations. Distributors can use the information and analysis from the inventory system to become better customers to their suppliers by analyzing trends and placing orders that do not have to change in the middle of fulfillment. Better orders, improved receiving processes, and integration with supplier systems all work to make vendor transaction run smoother.
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Reduced compliance costs. Many distributors are subject to strict governmental and insurance regulations because of the materials they carry in inventory. Distribution management software can generate much of the required compliance documentation as a consequence of ordering and receiving materials and equipment.
The chief issue with wholesale distribution software systems is lag time. Even when the various modules and components share a database, which is the norm now, there is a time lag between when events occur and when they are recorded. This can lead to improper decisions. Most systems are written with the assumption that changes are made and transmitted instantly; reality is different.
For example, when a customer places an order, ideally the value of that order should be immediately moved from current inventory and appear in accounts receivable. What really happens is that the order is entered, the inventory is tagged as “Allocated”, the pick list is generated, the inventory is picked and packaged. If the shipment is free on board (FOB) origin, once the order is picked up, the items should be removed from inventory. The inventory system’s recorded location of the inventory at any given time has important tax and floor planning considerations, which can affect cash flow.
The other limitation is expense. Even basic warehouse distribution software systems use bar codes, mobile readers, and a wireless network. More advanced systems require an extensive infrastructure that potentially requires every location on every shelf to have some form of hardware installed.
Have an opinion on this guide? Email the authors. We appreciate the feedback.
