Automatic Bakery makes gourmet, partially-baked breads that are available to supermarket customers who want to finish cooking at home. Among their foodservice customers is a nationwide network of food trucks. For Kelly Melody, the Owner-operator and Chief Carb Lover, it’s essential that her time is spent growing her half-baked bread empire, instead of dealing with half-baked software.
As Automatic Bakery grows, Kelly wants to be sure their systems grow with it. But she was nervous about making the leap when she doesn’t have time to deal with setting up a new software system.
“We came from one system, which was cobbled together, but it worked for us. I didn't know how we were going to switch to Upstock and keep it seamless. But Upstock was amazing, they just did it all!”
Kelly's biggest concern was how she would transition a large customer, with 28 franchises, over to the new system. She especially wanted to be sure they understood the process change and didn’t struggle with orders. And she didn’t want to be left to fend for herself while making a major tech transition for her business. But with Upstock’s support crew, she felt confident all the way through.
“Support from the Upstock team has been great. Getting set up was really seamless and super easy. On the day we went live with Upstock we just felt so confident in it.”
Now that she’s taken the leap, she says to others on the fence about transitioning to Upstock “Just go and do it and Upstock will set it all up for you. Just get it done!”
“We’ve gotten back at least half a day a week in sales admin, plus the time saved by our packing team who now don’t have to sort out mis-picks. Also, I love having the confidence that it's actually working and I don't have to think about it. I know all the stuff that we picked today has been sent out all over the country, I know there's been an invoice generated for it, and then I'll get paid for it. I don't have to go and double-check everything. We've had zero customers come back with invoice queries since we've had Upstock – it’s seamless.”
More from our chat with Kelly:
Describe your customers?
Our customers love to socialise, they like going to barbecues or around to their friends’ houses and they don’t like to arrive empty-handed. They don't necessarily have time to be toiling away in the kitchen before they go. So they're looking to grab a meat pack and something cool to take with them on the way. Or maybe because it's a Tuesday night, they take a loaf of bread like our balsamic onion and feta loaf, instead of taking a bottle of wine.
What do you love most about your business?
It's really exciting to have a new product in a market where nobody's given it a really good crack. We're having some really great conversations with people from big companies and it has been so humbling to think that we've been able to think up this idea during this crazy time in history and get it to market.
If you are forced to go back to that time when you were not using Upstock, what would you say?
You don't know, what you don't know. With our old system, we thought everything was pretty good. It worked, we got by and I would say there are a lot of people in that same position. But the difference between then and now is night and day. Going back would be hectic. Now I don't even think about it. It doesn't even occur to me to go and re-check everything.
See all the benefits of Upstock for bakeries