PME Cake Ecommerce Case Study - Red Technology UK

International, B2B & Retail Ecommerce for cake decoration and baking supplies manufacturer.

Since 1956, PME Cake have proudly supplied cake decorating and baking supplies to professionals, enthusiasts and home bakers in 86 countries. With a heritage in product engineering in plastic and steelwork, PME Cake distinguishes itself in the market as a brand you can trust, with product innovation and quality at the heart of their culture.

"The new site will bring us into the 21st century as our online footprint to date was very weak even though we have a brand that is over 60 years. It also puts us into a great position with the changing retail space and everything moving to online. Red Technology are a fantastic team that you will be able to rely on. We truly feel we are partners, not clients."

Ecommerce Manager, PME Cake

Project Highlights

Multiple sites
Multiple B2B and Retail sites all administered from a single instance of tradeit
B2B
Rich B2B functionality including quick orders, saved baskets, financial statements, user management and account information (credit limit, available credit, credit terms, account balance).
Global ecommerce
Localised, international sites for the UK, US, Spain, France, Germany, The Netherlands + the Pan Pacific (Oceania, Asia & Hong Kong).
Call centre/MOTO
Built-in call centre tools providing customers support and offline order processing
Invoices
Financial statements available via web services with invoices that can be paid/part-paid online, including via credit notes
My Account
Easily managed, B2B customer accounts with quick order form, saved baskets, financial statements, address book, and wishlist
Integrated blog
Retail sites feature integrated blog with recipes, tips and ideas
Payment options
Multiple payment options including on account, credit/debit card, BACS and pro-forma, plus integration with multiple PSPs for different international channels
Integrations
2-way integrations with Microsoft Dynamics GP using both web services and XML data transfers

Project Integrations

Project Overview

When PME Cake first approached us in 2017, they had no online presence and were looking to take the first steps on their digital journey. As a 60+ year-old brand, their customers had always ordered via traditional channels and senior management were wary of upsetting this established process. So, in order to gauge interest and acquire buy-in, they first opted to use a low-end, off-the-shelf system to deliver a proof of concept and establish the demand for ecommerce was there. Having run the trial for approximately 12 months and seen the uptake, they returned in early 2019, eager to deliver a more sophisticated and user-friendly system that would service the needs of their B2B and Retail customers, integrate easily with Microsoft Dynamics GP, as well as scaling to meet future requirements including the launch of several international channels. For this they chose tradeit.

PME Cake ecommerce site on tablet and mobile phone

B2B & Retail Ecommerce

As a predominantly B2B/Wholesale business, PME Cake needed an ecommerce platform that was natively designed to support such a model. That means functionality is inherent to the platform so tools like online invoicing (view, pay, part-pay, see credit notes), account management (credit limit, credit terms, account balance), quick orders and saved baskets is all available.

However, having some B2C channels as well meant that more retail focussed functions like a blog were also required. Fortunately, as tradeit has been designed from the ground up to support international B2B, Retail and D2C ecommerce it's able to provide specific tools aimed at each unique business model across any channel.

Microsoft Dynamics GP ecommerce integration

As one of the main reasons for choosing Red was our vast experience in integrating with the Microsoft Dynamics suite of products, the 2-way flow of data between tradeit and their ERP was crucial. This means data like credit limits and financial statements is pulled from Dynamics GP to tradeit in real time using web services, whilst other information like customer and order information is pushed from tradeit back to GP via XML. This ensures both systems are harmonious and up to date, whilst saving on lots of manual processing.

Global Ecommerce

Having originally started with two UK channels, quickly followed by a US site, PME Cake have been quick to seize on the international capabilities of tradeit and quickly expand their business overseas. Following the UK's decision to withdraw from the EU, separate channels for Spain, France, Germany & The Netherlands have been launched to help fulfil orders from the EU and avoid much of the paperwork now required when shipping goods from the UK. A new channel to support Asia and Oceania was also launched out of Hong Kong. Other new channels are also in the pipeline, helping to expand their operations across the world. A big change for a company who barely had a web presence just a few short years ago.

One side effect of the rapid international expansion has been the limitation of their payment providers in being able to service all their different international channels. However, despite all being on the same installation of tradeit, different channels can be serviced by a different PSP, so TRU//ST Payments and Adyen have both been integrated with tradeit for different markets, meaning there has been no disruption to the business and customers still have multiple payment methods available to them across each of their channels.

PME Cake have shown that by embracing the demand of their customers to buy online, and selecting a class-leading B2B and Retail Ecommerce Platform, the potential for growth is enormous, particularly with their drive to expand internationally. We expect them to go from strength to strength as they continue to grow.