Company Profile
CREA.D is a bag and accessory manufacturer founded in 2017, with two factories based in Shiling, China. The company is committed to high-quality production, competitive pricing, and environmentally conscious manufacturing practices.
They serve a global clientele, with a manufacturing base in northern Guangzhou and offices in Hong Kong.
- Industry: Fashion accessories and bag manufacturing
- Size: 60+ employees
- Revenue: ~10M USD annual turnover
- ERP Hosting: Odoo Enterprise (self-hosted in China)
- Unique Traits: Emphasis on sustainability and high product customization for OEM clients
Challenges Faced
Before the digital transformation, CREA.D operated mainly via Excel sheets, leading to disjointed operations and versioning chaos across teams. Their main challenges included:
- Managing complex product designs with multiple pattern, material, and color variants, often modified throughout sampling.
- Lack of integration across costing, sales, production, inventory, and accounting workflows.
- Manual tracking of production samples, packing lists, and customer changes created risk of error and miscommunication.
- Need for a multi-company setup (Hong Kong and China entities) with linked accounting and inventory.
- Requirement to preserve Excel exportability during the transition, so the team could continue familiar processes without disruption.
- First-time ERP users, requiring training and change management support.
Odoo Implementation
To address these challenges, we implemented Odoo Enterprise as a full-suite solution across all departments:
- Modules Deployed: CRM, Sales, Purchase, Inventory, Manufacturing, Accounting, Studio
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Product Design Support:
- Custom cost sheet system using Odoo Studio to accommodate color mapping, material selection, and sampling modifications.
- Each product variant tracks a full chain of modifications from customer request to approved production version.
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Excel Compatibility:
- Designed all product and costing reports with XLS export capabilities to match legacy workflows.
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Operational Flows:
- Integrated the Packing List and Loading Plan concepts directly into sales and delivery workflows.
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Multi-Company Configuration:
- Linked China manufacturing and Hong Kong sales operations under Odoo’s multi-company setup.
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Training & Adoption:
- Onsite and remote training sessions delivered to introduce centralized workflows and reporting.
Version & Hosting:
- Odoo Enterprise v16
- Hosted on a local Chinese server with support from the Majorbird China team
Business Benefits
Since the implementation, CREA.D has experienced notable improvements in multiple areas:
Operational Efficiency
- Time spent on product creation and costing has dropped significantly thanks to centralized templates and automation.
- CRM integrated with product workflows, allowing customer feedback to be immediately reflected in BOM and costing.
- Packing list and loading plans standardized across the sales and warehouse teams, reducing errors during delivery.
Cost Accuracy & Decision Making
- Custom costing methodology provides better insight into sample cost vs. final cost.
- Enhanced visibility into material usage, procurement needs, and supplier pricing.
Scalability
- The system now supports future modules like GSD integration (for work time tracking on production lines).
- Multi-company accounting and inventory flows are in place, ready to scale as the company grows or opens new branches.