Tele-Tukku, one of Finland's leading suppliers of electronic components, integrated their ERP, e-commerce, product information management (PIM), financial management, and other systems into a single platform — Odoo. This migration to a unified system brought Tele-Tukku monthly savings of over €5,000. "In addition to the financial savings, Odoo has significantly reduced the time and effort we spend on operations," says CEO Pasi Latva-Käyrä.
Tele-Tukku is an importer and wholesaler of electronic components and accessories, serving wholesalers across Finland with over 12,000 products. Their B2B e-commerce site is not just a sales channel but also a vital source of information for wholesalers. Around 15% of Tele-Tukku's sales are exported, and they work with nearly 100 suppliers.
Outdated e-commerce platform sparks a chain of changes
Pasi Latva-Käyrä has led Tele-Tukku for 35 years. During this time, two ERP projects left him with bitter memories, leading him to vow never to undergo such a process again.
Instead, Pasi planned to upgrade the old e-commerce platform and began exploring alternatives. The quote from their vendor for the upgraded platform was close to €200,000, with a project timeline of one year and ongoing license and maintenance costs exceeding €45,000 annually. This prompted Pasi to seek other options, eventually leading him to Odoo and SprintIT.
One thing led to another. Although there was nothing particularly wrong with the existing ERP and PIM systems, Pasi saw so many advantages and clear savings in centralizing everything within Odoo that he decided to make the switch.
Keeping Odoo's monthly costs under control
The cost of implementing the new Odoo system was minimized by consolidating all functionalities into one comprehensive system instead of maintaining several separate ones.
Pasi highlights the savings with an example from their online store's chat function. In Odoo, chat is part of the standard e-commerce functionality, with no additional charges. Had they continued with the old multi-system setup, it would have cost €16,000 to install the chat function and associated features, plus €680 per month in running costs.
All in all, Pasi now pays less than €1,000 per month for Odoo, including financial management and accounting. Under the old model, the cost of similar activities was several times higher.
Publishing products directly to the online shop in seconds
"With everything centralized in Odoo, we save a tremendous amount of time. There’s less manual work, fewer errors, and no more waiting for data transfers."
Previously, with a mix of multiple systems, it could take up to two days to publish a simple product in the online store. First, the product was created in the ERP with pricing and basic information, which was then imported into the PIM with delays ranging from hours to days. After enriching the data in PIM, the product was finally published on the e-commerce site.
"Now, when I create a product in Odoo and press the publish button, it appears in the online store instantly. The time savings from eliminating delays and potential transfer issues are enormous," Pasi explains.
A better online store drives sales growth
In B2B wholesaling, 90% of revenue is generated through other channels, but e-commerce has played a crucial role as an information resource. Moving the online shop to Odoo improved usability so much that online sales doubled within a few months of the summer launch.
"Our online store now works like a dream. Customers have commented that products are easy to find and that the shopping experience on mobile is seamless. I’m confident that our online sales will continue to grow."
Time savings in financial management and daily communication, with more to come
With Odoo, many tasks have been simplified and automated, allowing Pasi to focus more on the company’s core business — sales.
Pasi estimates that the biggest time savings will come from financial management and daily communication tasks.
"Odoo's communication tools are the best. We use them everywhere. They’ve reduced the need for long explanatory emails and time spent searching for information. In Odoo, you can send a message directly about a specific issue, whether it’s related to an invoice, a purchase, product information, or customer details. We no longer waste time looking for things."
"The time savings in financial management are very tangible. It’s incredibly convenient to approve purchase invoices when they’re directly linked to purchases. In sales, reference payments are recorded automatically. Only unclear cases are flagged for manual review. Invoicing has also been completely transformed. We used to send paper invoices to branches, but now everything is done directly in Odoo."
More time savings are on the horizon. Tele-Tukku is currently working on automatic pricing in Odoo. One client might have over 1,000 products, making price updates a massive task. In the old system, purchase prices, three selling prices, and recommended prices were updated in different places. Now, Tele-Tukku is defining pricing rules in Odoo. Once this feature is live, updating prices across multiple channels will become a thing of the past.
Standard Odoo introduced in phases as needed
In Odoo, functions can be added incrementally as needs arise. Adding new modules does not increase the cost of user licenses.
"We're currently using only a fraction of Odoo’s capabilities: e-commerce, financial management, warehouse management, sales, purchase management, and CRM. We plan to gradually introduce more features, including marketing tools, HR, and payroll as soon as they become available."
So far, the standard Odoo features have been sufficient for Tele-Tukku.
"We decided against extensive customizations. We prefer to adapt our processes to fit Odoo's standard functionalities. If Odoo’s processes are good enough for millions of users worldwide, then they’re good enough for us too," Pasi concludes.
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