Codorniu: Managing Promotions And Controlling Sales Points With XTEL

The company chose the Sales Promo and Sales Execution modules to optimize their trade promotion effectiveness, ensure that agreed-upon promotions are properly effected at sales points and promptly follow competitors' actions.

A maker of top quality sparkling wine since 1551, Codorniu creates the perfect mixture of the finest grapes from the best vineyards of Catalonia, a land of sun and fragrance. Five hundred years of history are behind Codorniu's great success ( www.codorniu.com ). But, of course, this long tradition alone cannot maintain its leadership in the fiercely competitive wine industry.

This is why the famous Catalan winery decided to implement two modules of the XTEL's SM1 suite. XTEL is an international company specialized in solutions for automating commercial processes for consumer goods companies throughout Europe. The modules are Sales Promo and Sales Execution, two targeted solutions from XTEL. Sales Promo helps in planning and and controlling all promotional activities, both nationally and locally. Sales Execution lets sales points be monitored and controlled to ensure that agreed-upon activities are correctly implemented and products actually reach customers as well as to promptly follow competitors' actions.

"Up to now we didn't use any technological solutions for managing these areas," says Codorniu's IT director, Tona Monedero. "But recent growing competitiveness in our industry prompted us to streamline some processes. The choice went to XTEL because of its excellent references, its specialization in the complex market of Southern Europe, and for its complete, integrated suite for automating commercial processes. We may well consider using other modules in the future. We saw SM1 as the best solution on the market as it is flexible, targeted and focused on our business. "

The use of Sales Promo will affect about twenty people who work on site and will use the system to manage the promotional calendar, from planning to monitoring and controlling the execution of agreed-upon promotions. Sales Execution will be installed on Tablet PCs given to approximately 100 employees for monitoring of sales points with modern distribution systems. In the offline mode, they will gather information about the products' presence and positioning (they can be photographed and sent to the headquarters), prices, agreed-upon promotions and competitors' activities. Both modules will be integrated with SAP ERP and business intelligence solutions used by Codorniu (currently Board from 2011 Business Objects).

Rovagnati revamps its commercial policies with XTEL's dedicated solutions

Rovagnati, a leading delicatessen meat producer, has implemented five modules of the SM1 suite

The feather in the company's cap is its Granbiscotto ham, which is one of the most popular and best selling brands in Italy. Yet, there is much more to Rovagnati. In recent years it has expanded its product portfolio to cover the entire delicatessen product range. In addition, its long-time Biassono location has been gradually joined by other production sites that are at the forefront in Europe in terms of size, technology and safety with a very high degree of automation: its a food industry powerhouse that has revenues of almost 250 million euros per year and employs 430 in-house employees, 100 outside partners and a network of over 250 direct sellers. Rovagnati delicatessen meats are found in more than 25,000 stores and more than 10,000 large retail outlets. Yet, normal trade is the real core of their distribution, and their sales volume for retail stores equal, and sometimes exceed, those in supermarkets. This is achieved through a policy that pays close attention to distribution channels and the direct sales network: 250 individuals in whose professional skills the company decided to invest, including with innovative, effective information technology tools. The expansion of the product line, coupled with the large variety and number of outlets in different channels, profoundly affected the choice of the new structure for the information technology systems. The choice aimed at organizational agility, maximum automation and integration of all processes. As planned, this major shift supported an organizational and strategic change essential to strengthen Rovagnati's position among the top five players in the delicatessen meat industry in Italy.

The best vertical applications for each business area

"For years, our information system was based on JDE ERP, amply customized to specific areas, says Ivano Croci, head of information services. Then, in late 2007, we realized that we needed to make a major leap forward in terms of quality in our information technology. As we'd planned it, the JDE ERP would continue to do its standard job as best it could, while we would look for very specialized, effective vertical applications that would give us competitive advantages in our different areas." Needless to say, the trade area was the one on which we put the greatest emphasis. "We wanted to underscore the strategic importance of our sales network and innovate trade practices, especially to keep timely control over what is happening in traditional stores, which has a greater importance for us than it does for our competitors," the manager continued. Furthermore, we wanted to eliminate communication problems and discrepancies caused by using unlinked systems (e.g., agreements with large distribution depended on the ERP, while the sales force was managed by a special application) through the use of a single dedicated, integrated system." The choice went to several modules of the SM1 suite by XTEL, the European specialist in commercial process automation for consumer goods manufacturers. Last September, we implemented Sales Agreement for managing agreements with large distribution; Sales Promo for complete control of promotions, to which we will add an analysis and results measurement extension; Sales Force for coordinating the sales force; and Sales Pricing & Order Management to manage the pricing policies of traditional channels and their correct application to orders. In addition, SM1, rather than the company's ERP, manages the customer information and hierarchy. However, the Sales Execution module for the correct execution of commercial policies at sales points, is used only in part: implementation is scheduled for 2011.

"We chose XTEL because we wanted to develop our capacities"

"Why did we choose XTEL? Because we wanted to develop our capacities, says Stefano Ferrari, commercial director. We did not make the choice impulsively; we met different suppliers and discussed it for a year. XTEL won us over, because where we were lacking - promotions, sales point control, order intake - it could give us the competitive edge we were looking for." For example, now we can keep control over of orders to be delivered, which before XTEL was less exacting and effective. so that we can manage prices and conditions based on centrally defined rules, or be certain that a customer is solvent, while maintaining the typical very short response times that are essential for the fresh foodstuffs industry. Plus, within the management agreements, "outlying" employees can directly insert local agreements in the system. The day the new system went into full operation almost 2000 orders came in. Now an average of 1600 are managed a day, a quite significant amount, which has to be coordinated with production capacities and needs. Agents collect customer orders on their rounds and send them to headquarters as soon as possible. "The level of control over orders is very high and delivery times have not changed," says the managing director, Alessandro Calori. This has allowed us to optimize the number of people who manage this task, because the commercial conditions are precise and centralized, and the system itself blocks anything outside of a certain acceptance range. Plus, there is optimal transparency. Over the past six months, the market has become much more aggressive; in this climate, agents' initiative is a resource, though within established systems. Of course, the adoption of the system wasn't painless", he continued, "but we are going forward successfully because of the solutions' ease of use, within the ability even of those who may be less used to technology. "

The next step: analysis and forecasting with XTEL data

"Normally, the promotional pressure in our industry is not high, but, like in other industries, it has recently increased considerably, the commercial director, Ferrari, noted.With the implementation of the XTEL dedicated module, centrally defined guidelines are available with which all the regional managers or individual customers can take necessary action. Then, we have detailed information that is useful to measure the result of each promotion, whereas before we couldn't access timely data. In September, one year after the system's implementation, we expect to be able to see exactly which initiatives were actually effective and to what extent and which ones should be discontinued." But Rovagnati has even higher expectations: "The plan is to generate, through XTEL and its integrated solutions, continuous streams of information to organize our data warehouse, and develop models for ad hoc analysis to obtain accurate forecasts and studies in the different sectors," Ferrari says. In the second half of this year we will already focus on this aspect, from which we expect to benefit greatly. "