Bangn Body + DEAR Inventory (Cin7 Core)
Bangn Body's journey to seamless inventory management
Founded in 2019, Bangn Body is a successful startup Skincare business, whose products are multi-purpose, simple and effective. They have found huge success over their journey, but with this significant growth they also faced new challenges; namely, how to implement a system that would suit the growing demands of their business, while still facilitating further growth? That’s when they partnered up with Business Continuum to implement DEAR Inventory. We spoke with Co-Founder and Warehouse and Logistics Manager, Jake Livock about how DEAR has helped his business throughout the course of 2021.
Hi Jake! Tell us a little about your business. How did things start, and how has it grown so significantly these past two years?
Priscilla’s family has always been in the skincare game, so she started conceptualising the product and brand as early as two years before launch. We chose to start the business in March 2019 and were packing out of our living room for the first 6 months. Pretty soon, it started getting way too big for that, so we got our first warehouse after 1 year, we kept growing until we moved into a third and larger warehouse, which is where we are now.
Looking back from when you first started, do you still consider yourself a startup?
Because of the amount of orders we worked through, I would say no. But because of how young the business is, I would say yes, so the answer is somewhere in the middle.
I would still ultimately count us as a startup, as we still have room to grow. Our plan is to begin to go international. Currently we have a great foothold in Australia and New Zealand. We are looking at international growth after Christmas, starting with the United States, then expanding into Europe.
“Everything would be accounted for, it was pretty much fool-proof and just picked up everything we needed. It covered our P.O’s, logistics requirements, shipping orders and was already integrated with Shopify.”
Do you get a sense as to why the brand is resonating so well? What are the key ingredients to your success?
The major reason is that we have a product that actually works. If you have a product that works you aren’t selling a secret to anyone. You need to have a product that people want and need, which then becomes a major key to success.
The other reason would be our social media marketing. If you’re going to start a business, start building your social media as early as you can. You can’t sell a secret, so tell people what your product is and how it works, and that will make it easier to sell.
Lastly, if you are going to be a business founder you need to love it. Love your product and love what you do. If you can’t sell it to yourself, you can’t sell it to anyone.
What is one of the biggest lessons learned in preparing a warehouse, and planning for growth?
To make sure you have space for forecasting. We had a lot of space and forecast for a big Christmas December period, but we still ended up having to rent out as many of 10 storage units to hold our extra stock. Truly understanding your forecasting requirements and using it to your advantage is a powerful thing.
What happened as you took the journey from spreadsheets to beginning to look at an actual inventory system?
Steph, our accountant from Pinnacle Road, was able to look after our forecasting on spreadsheets when we were only worrying about a couple hundred sales a day. We managed everything through multiple spreadsheets, but it was starting to get messy. When we moved to our second warehouse and our scale kept growing, things were getting really messy, really quick. We did 5 stock counts in 6 months just to keep up with where our stock levels actually were. This was when we engaged Business Continuum to assist with managing our stock with a suitable inventory solution.
How would you describe the process of implementing DEAR in comparison to other software?
We were already using Shopify for saleable products, but that wasn’t tracking the items we weren’t selling. We needed to keep track of empty boxes, empty tubes and packing boxes to name a few. When we started to look at DEAR Inventory with Business Continuum, we realised it was going to greatly streamline our processes. Everything would be accounted for, it was pretty much fool-proof and just picked up everything we needed. It covered our P.O’s, logistics requirements, shipping orders and was already integrated with Shopify.
What surprises about the implementation of DEAR have you found after using it for a few months?
On the reporting side of things, it’s become a lot easier for myself and the accountants to see how much is going in and out each month. You can match the reporting with Google Analytics and Shopify and was pretty much spot on. Our inventory management has gotten a lot better. We have gone from doing stock takes every couple of weeks to two a year.
Also, I used to handwrite the pick slips manually, but now with DEAR we can just input the order, and it spits out a pick slip it’s streamlined the process with everything related to the order in one hub.
Finally, you can manage the whole system through one person because of its simplicity. Everything can be managed off the one computer, so while everyone knows the basics, it has simplified the daily tasks for the team.
Will DEAR be able to service your needs in the future?
One hundred percent. We try to keep our SKU’s at a minimum, as our business is based around having products that do multiple things. DEAR will definitely be able to hold the amount of stock we plan to use going forward and assist us in scaling the business internationally in the near future.
How was it working with Business Continuum throughout the implementation?
Minal was great with onboarding. We still go to him when we have questions, and he was great during the implementation. He was really quick to respond, and if something was wrong, he would take the time to explain it to me so I understood the solution better. He would send me spreadsheets to fill out and within a couple of days the information was all there in DEAR, up and running. He did a really good job of implementing for us with a tight turn-around.
If you are looking to tailor an inventory solution for your business, please don’t hesitate to contact us for a free demonstration.