80%

Time saved on invoicing

75%

Time saved on order processing

7.5

Hours saved on weekly product creation

Membership

Objective

Throughout Boston BioProducts’ membership with XRay, we’ve created an Airtable infrastructure that enables them to automate and track key workflows like order processing, shipping, invoicing, and product creation.

Background

Boston BioProducts (BBP) is a premier manufacturer and supplier of essential reagents used for life science research, diagnostics, and drug development purposes.

The Challenge

As Boston BioProducts continued to grow over the last several years, they were reaching a point where they needed to consider adopting a new ERP to streamline their processes and consolidate their data into a single application.

However, they were wary of the downsides that come with an ERP implementation. They knew it would mean abandoning the software and the processes that they had come to rely on, and that an ERP would come at a high cost.

When they first reached out to XRay, Boston BioProducts initially wanted to build a single automation that would connect their ecommerce platform, Magento, with all of their ordering channels. This would enable Boston BioProducts’ team to view all orders in a single location, whether they came through their website, email, phone, or fax.

Exploring this workflow led us to create not only an order processing automation, but an entire automated infrastructure built on Airtable.

The Solution

During the course of their membership, XRay has built several automated workflows for Boston BioProducts. Every workflow connects to a centralized Airtable base where Boston BioProducts’ team can view and manage critical data about products, orders, and shipping.

Order Processing & Invoicing

Whenever Boston BioProducts receives an order from any source, one of their Commercial Ops reps can start tracking the order by entering it into Magento.

From there, the order is automatically added as a record in their Airtable base. To comply with Boston BioProducts’ quality management system, the Commercial Operations team is alerted about the new order and prompted to review it for any potential errors.

Using a simple Airtable interface, the Boston BioProducts team can approve the order with a single click, or flag it for further review and updates.

Once approved, the order is then sent automatically from Airtable to Shipstation with all of the details needed for Boston BioProducts’ logistics team to pack and ship the order.

When the shipping label is created, the Finance team is notified and automatically receives an invoice in Quickbooks to review. If the invoice is correct, they can approve it with one click and send it to the customer.

What was previously a manual process is now almost entirely automated, with just a few key checkpoints where Boston BioProducts’ team can enter data and confirm that their inputs are accurate.

SKU Creation

As a manufacturer of reagent solutions and buffers, Boston BioProducts’ materials are used in a wide variety of pharmaceutical and research applications. To keep up with demand and match the specific needs of each customer segment, they create up to 35 unique products every week.

Manually creating a SKU for every product was time consuming and prone to error. To streamline the process, XRay has enabled Boston BioProducts to automatically generate a SKU for each new product in Airtable based on a predefined algorithm.

Once a product is created in Boston BioProducts’ Airtable base, automations in Pipedream and Airtable immediately add the product number to every relevant platform, like Magento and Quickbooks Online. If the SKU already exists in Magento or QBO, the product details will be updated automatically to prevent duplicate SKUs.

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The Results

Saving Time on Repetitive Processes

Every automated workflow that XRay has built for Boston BioProducts has helped them to dramatically reduce the amount of time spent on repetitive tasks.

Order processing time has been reduced by 75%, with every new order only requiring a minute or two to process. Additionally, if the order comes in through the web to Magento, it’s processed entirely automatically, requiring no manual work at all.

Our automations have also enabled Boston BioProducts to cut down the time spent on invoicing by 80%, again simplifying the process into a quick one minute task.

Boston BioProducts’ process for creating and logging new products has been reduced by over 90%, simplifying a 15-minute process conducted over 30 times a week down to a brief 1-2 minute job.

Revealing Data and Insights

By centralizing all of Boston BioProducts’ workflows in Airtable, XRay has enabled their team to see all of their data in a single place.

With a quick look at Airtable, they can analyze orders to sort by source, confirm order details, follow up on unpaid invoices, and more.

With XRay’s automations, Boston BioProducts has been able to make their workflows more efficient and start gathering key metrics without having to change tools. They’re still using Magento, Shipstation, Quickbooks, and all the other software that their company runs on.

The central Airtable base and each specific view that runs all of Boston BioProducts’ processes is accessible through a board in XRay Workflow. Boston BioProducts’ team just needs to open up a single tab to gain access to all of their frequently used workflows.

Next Steps

During the course of Boston BioProducts’ membership, XRay has identified many targets for future automations and plans to optimize the following workflows: 1. Quality Assurance, 2. Manufacturing, 3. Sales, and 4. Analytics.

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VIEW TOOL BELT

“It’s becoming vitally important for businesses of all types to invest in digital transformation. It’s a need now, not a luxury. XRay understands this, and they’re able to help businesses like ours scale digitally without having to change what already works.”