The name of our customer Coffee Circle does not stand for an afternoon coffee party (german: Kaffeekränzchen) – it actually describes the fair trade business model of the Berlin-based company, which we present to you in our success story of the month. Behind Coffee Circle is a team of around 50 experts for great coffee, who work every day for the best coffee taste and a thoroughly fair coffee trade. Behind Coffee Circle is a team of around 50 experts for great coffee, who work every day for the best coffee taste and a thoroughly fair coffee trade.
Each year a part of the international team travels to the countries of origin of the coffee to buy the best varieties of the current harvest on site. What is important for Coffee Circle is the personal connection to the coffee farmers and a fair payment that is far above the world market. Back in Germany, the coffee is roasted in the company’s own roastery in Berlin Wedding and prepared for resale. From there, Coffee Circle supplies private individuals, companies and cafés with fresh coffee of the highest quality. The special feature of the fair trade model:
With one project, Coffee Circle is financing access to clean drinking water for 18,900 people in the Limu region of Ethiopia. Past projects can also be read about on the Coffee Circle page. With its social commitment, Coffee Circle closes the circle and brings back support exactly to where the coffee comes from. With its social commitment, Coffee Circle closes the circle and brings back support exactly to where the coffee comes from.
Due to this sustainable approach and the high-quality products, the constant growth in recent years is not surprising. Coffee Circle supplies around 400 offices, 80 cafés and over 11,000 private customers every month. In addition to individual deliveries, customers can also choose to get a convenient coffee subscription. Further, Coffee Circle’s product range also includes coffee accessories and coffee machines for purchase or lease.
Every day, Coffee Circle processes over 2,000 orders due to its diverse range of products – a workload that can no longer be handled manually for a long time. When testing various ERP systems, Pickware ERP was able to convince the Berlin-based company with its functionality, intuitive operation and direct integration into Shopware, among other things.
While searching for a new ERP system, it was particularly important to Coffee Circle to find a reliable system whose developers are future-oriented and can thus constantly accompany Coffee Circle’s growth. Crucial for the choice were also the excellent support and the regular updates, which also support Coffee Circle in staying future-oriented. Especially with the release of individual pick profiles, Pickware WMS was able to optimally support the requirements of the growing shipping processes. The setup of different picking profiles simplifies picking and packing in the warehouse tremendously.
For example, one of their picking profiles is specially optimized for the shipping method called “Imagine Cargo”. This picking profile is used to identify all orders that are fulfilled by sustainable delivery through bicycle couriers in the Berlin area. The packages that are delivered with Imagine Cargo must be packed in a special way and be ready for pickup by the bicycle couriers at a specific time. The individual picking profile allows Coffee Circle to identify these orders and pick them according to the requirements by an employee trained for this process. In the future, the use of additional picking profiles is planned to optimize the warehouse process, for example, for orders with only one item or for self-pickup.
Other warehouse processes have also been optimized by the use of Pickware WMS. Manual printing and assignment of invoices and shipping labels as well as manual inventory postings and shipping control according to the dual control principle have been a thing of the past since the switch to Pickware. Coffee Circle works with 21 Pickware barcode scanners in the warehouse. The intuitive operation makes it possible to train new employees more quickly and also simplifies stocktaking through barcode-guided processes.
“I am very happy to have integrated our ERP directly into Shopware. The introduction of Pickware has simplified many processes internally and made them more transparent for everyone involved. We also use other plugins from Pickware and are very satisfied overall. If we have questions or problems, the team is always available and helps quickly.”
Katrin Simonis, Product Manager at Coffee Circle
The switch from the previously used shop system Magento to Shopware in combination with Pickware was uncomplicated, especially due to the personal contact and the support of our Pickware customer support. Thanks to the seamless integration of Pickware ERP into Shopware, Coffee Circle can fully concentrate on the essentials: Selling good coffee and doing good in the process!
More best practice examples can be found in our previous Pickware success stories.