Transfleur BV, based in Aalsmeer, is a wholesaler in the domestic market, buying for florists, wholesalers and garden centres. ‘Trading flowers and plants’ is what they do in a ‘unique and professional way’ through close cooperation with customers, value for money and transport options.
A merger between Van Beest Groothandel and Transfleur took place at the beginning of this year. Van Beest acquired Transfleur and decided to continue under this name as well.
Since Barry van Beest, one of the owners of Transfleur, is already an enthusiastic user of AlfaPro NEXT, the choice to start using the same software package for Transfleur was not a complicated decision.
Pim and Jordy took up this project and implemented NEXT. Read the customer query below and find out how we fixed things.
Customer query
- Combining business acquisition of Transfleur by Van Beest Groothandel with implementation of new software package AlfaPro NEXT
- Transferring webshop and customer base from current company Van Beest Groothandel to Transfleur’s new software package
- Convert customised solution in old software package to standard way of working in NEXT
Solution
A timely start was made on setting up a separate package for Transfleur. In this set-up, existing customers from the Van Beest package were transferred, so customers were known in both packages.
Van Beest Groothandel’s working method has been adopted into the Transfleur package and provided with its own documents and labels. A schedule was created for the webshop, allowing customers to be informed in a timely manner. This has been a collaboration between ALFA PRO, Studio Projection and Hellenique Art&Design BV.
NEXT package Transfleur leading
This cooperation went smoothly, resulting in the webshop being offline for only a few hours at a scheduled time, allowing all parties involved to make the necessary adjustments. So apart from a different URL, existing customers have felt pretty little of the migration.
After this, the Transfleur package became leading. Van Beest’s original NEXT package is now focused on Van Beest Retail BV’s core business, allowing shops to keep their own stock, package and administration.
Response owner Barry van Beest
‘With Van Beest, we had been a satisfied customer with ALFA and user of AlfaPro for many years. When ALFA came out with its successor NEXT, we again chose their package. We obviously looked at other parties and software packages, but NEXT really stood out for us. It looked very good and the value for money was great. We are still very happy with this choice and it was obvious to use NEXT for Transfleur as well.
Implementation
The implementation of NEXT went fine. The contact with Pim and Jordy was good, the guys know what they are doing. I also liked the fact that we could learn from each other. Sometimes something turned out to be slightly different in practice than previously thought. I then discussed this with them and this was handled well and a solution sought. Whenever I had points they always came back to this nicely. Sometimes also saying that a wish was not realistic to include in NEXT by default. This does need to be functional for a wider audience. And I understand that too.’
Benefits NEXT
When asked what benefits NEXT offers them, Barry replies wholeheartedly: ‘Legion! It is a fresh new programme, it is fast, the imagery is very good and the package has many applications such as VMP links and connections with other packages. The importance of images and item data has become much more important, and NEXT offers many possibilities for this.
Rethinking
Overall, our employees are overwhelmingly positive about NEXT. It is easy to use, but people are still used to doing things a certain way in the ‘old’ programme. If this does not go, the first reaction is to fuss at the programme. But functionality is sometimes just in there, only it has to be in a different way. It is then a matter of rethinking. But you learn from this too.’
What next?
‘Last year we went through two implementations, namely the migration at Van Beest from AlfaPro to NEXT and recently the switch at Transfleur to NEXT. All in all, this is quite intensive and we are happy that it is running to our full satisfaction. There are no plans for expansion at the moment. However, there are numerous possibilities within NEXT that we are not yet using. We want to deploy and apply all these facets in order to make optimal use of the package’s possibilities. Because everything you can automate you don’t have to do yourself!’ Says Barry van Beest.
