Custom ERP for B2B FMCG distribution

Context

An FMCG distributor (food & beverages) covering 6 counties, with 120 active SKUs, 800 B2B customers (HoReCa and traditional retail), 12 field agents and 8 drivers on fixed routes.

Before the project, operations used:

An ordering SaaS that did not talk to the invoicing system
Smartbill for invoicing, with manual entry
WhatsApp Business to talk to the field agents
Excel for routes, warehouses and consignment inventory

Challenges

Triple entry: every order was typed into 3 different systems, with the errors adding up
No traceability: a customer complaint about a delivery took 30-40 minutes of manual digging across 3 systems
Field agents worked on paper forms and typed them in every evening, 2-3 hours of admin work a day
End-of-day close at the warehouses took 90 to 120 minutes, with manual reconciliation
e-Invoicing compliance (Romania's mandatory e-Factura): manual effort on every invoice, with no check before submission

Approach

We built one ERP with 5 integrated modules and a mobile app for the field agents.

ERP backbone

Central SKU catalog with prices per customer category (HoReCa, retail)
Order workflow: agent → credit check → picking → delivery → confirmation → invoicing
Real-time stock per warehouse and consignment
e-Invoices generated automatically, with XML validation before submission to ANAF (the tax authority)

Mobile app (Android)

Catalog with offline search + SKU images
Quick orders with automatic reorder based on customer history
Digital signature on delivery (electronic POD)
Automatic sync when online, local queue when not

Route module

Daily route optimization per site
Optional GPS tracking (explicit employee consent)
Automatic end-of-day report for every driver

Executive reporting

KPIs per agent, warehouse, product category, region
Top customers by marginal contribution
Alert on stock below minimum, 7 days ahead

ANAF e-Invoicing integration

Automatic daily submission
Retry on temporary errors
10-year archive, as the law requires

Results

Orders processed per day: triple the capacity with the same number of operators (single entry, automatic checks)
Invoicing errors down 85%: checks at product and customer level
End-of-day close down from 90-120 min to under 30 min
Field agent satisfaction: 4.7/5 after 60 days of use (before, the WhatsApp + paper routine drew constant complaints)
Full traceability: any order can be audited in under 1 minute

Tech stack

Backend: Node.js + NestJS + PostgreSQL
Web frontend: React + TanStack Query
Mobile: React Native + local SQLite
ANAF integration: dedicated service with a retry queue
Hosting: AWS (eu-central-1) + cross-region S3 backup
Monitoring: Datadog + PagerDuty for on-call

Status

In production for 8 months. Next phase: integration with the 4 ERP systems of the largest retail customers, which require EDI in their own formats.

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