Hardware, paint and sanitary shops

The trade

How this trade really works

From the factory to the customer, each person in the chain wants something different. Most of what goes wrong comes from the gaps between them.

The company or wholesaler

Supplies pipes, taps, fittings, paint, wire, locks, hinges, screws, tools and adhesives. Each pushes its own schemes and wants a bigger order before month end.

The owner and the main godown

Buys for all branches, often from the main shop. Gets better rates by buying in bulk, then sends goods out to branches by tempo or by hand. Wants every branch stocked without money stuck in slow items.

The branch and its counter staff

Each branch has its own manager and its own crowd. One sits near new colonies and sells to builders and contractors. Another is in the old market and sells repair items to plumbers and households. The staff know their regular customers by face.

The plumber, painter, electrician or carpenter

Comes with a list, often in a hurry, and expects to find everything in one shop. If one item is missing, he may buy the whole list elsewhere. Usually buys on credit and settles at the end of a job.

The home owner or contractor

Pays the final bill, often through the tradesman. Wants the right tap, the right shade and the right fitting today, not tomorrow.

The shop lives on small things

A hardware shop sells screws by the box and by the piece, hinges in many sizes, washers, clamps, tapes, sealants, wall plugs and fittings that cost very little each. They are hard to count and easy to lose. But a plumber who cannot find one bend or one washer may take his whole list to the next shop. The small items bring the big bills.

Each branch is a different shop

The branch on the highway near new buildings sells pipes, tanks, cement-based products, big paint tins and contractor orders. The branch in the old market sells taps, washers, locks, small paint tins and repair items. The same owner buys for both. Often both get the same mix, and each is short of what its customers ask for.

Stock moves between branches by phone

A customer wants a certain mixer tap. The branch does not have it. The manager calls another branch, a boy brings it on a scooter, and the sale is made. Nobody writes it down properly. At year end, one branch shows a loss on that tap and another shows extra stock that does not exist.

Paint and sanitary goods have shades, finishes and sizes

A tap comes in chrome, matte and gold finishes. A tile adhesive comes in many pack sizes. A paint shade comes from a base mixed at the branch machine. When stock is counted only by item name, the shop believes it has the item, but not the finish or size the customer wants.

Credit follows the tradesman across branches

A contractor picks up goods at the highway branch on Monday and the market branch on Thursday. Each branch keeps its own book. The owner does not know the full amount he owes until someone adds it up, usually at Diwali. By then some of it is hard to recover.

Seasons hit the branches differently

Before Diwali, paint and small fittings fly off every counter. In the monsoon, new building slows, so the highway branch goes quiet while the market branch is busy with leaking pipes and repairs. Many owners send the same stock to both in both seasons, and both suffer.

The owner trusts the busy counter

The branch with the longest queue looks like the best branch. But a busy counter selling cheap fittings at thin margins may earn less than a quieter branch selling taps and premium paint. Without profit by item and by branch, the owner rewards the noise, not the money.

Where the money quietly goes

What you cannot see today, and what it costs you

You cannot see what each branch really holds

Your stock list is one long list for the whole business, or a different list in each branch that never matches. When a customer asks for something, the staff check by walking round the shelves. Often the item is in another branch and nobody knows.

Dead stock hides in every branch

Every branch has a corner of old tap designs, paint in shades nobody asked for again, and fittings for a pipe system that a builder stopped using. Old stock in a showroom is a discount you have not given yet. Nobody has put a value on that corner, so nobody acts on it.

Branch transfers leak

Goods move between branches by scooter and by phone. Some are written down, some are not. Some never reach the other branch at all. The loss shows up only as a stock difference at year end, and nobody can trace when it started.

You do not know which items lose money

Some items are sold below what they cost once freight, breakage and scheme returns are counted. They sell well, so nobody questions them. Meanwhile the shop keeps buying more of them.

You see the total, not the branch

The business made money this year. But one branch may be carrying the others. Without seeing each branch on its own, you cannot tell whether a branch needs better stock, a better manager or to be closed.

Staff see everything, everywhere

When all branches share one system and one login, any staff member can see any branch's stock and sales. Mistakes made in one branch get booked against another. It is hard to hold one manager responsible for one shop.

A season, the way it usually goes

The story you already know

It is October in Indore. The owner runs a main shop in the old market and branches near a new township on the bypass and in a residential colony. Diwali is close. He orders paint, taps and fittings for all of them in one big lot from his main suppliers and splits it evenly.

At the bypass branch, contractors are asking for large paint tins and plastic tanks. The branch has small tins and decorative taps instead. At the colony branch, households want small tins, door handles and festive lights, and the shelves are full of contractor-size pipe fittings. All day, staff call each other. Boys carry tins and boxes across town on scooters. Scraps of paper record some of it.

After Diwali, the owner counts. The bypass branch shows missing stock. The colony branch has extra tins that its records do not explain. A whole shelf of taps in an old finish, bought at a scheme a year ago, is still sitting in the market shop. A contractor who bought at all branches owes more than anyone thought. The owner had his busiest month of the year, and he cannot say which branch actually made money.

What you can now decide

Decisions you could not make before

Stock each branch for its own customers

When you compare branches item by item, you see the bypass branch sells contractor goods and the colony branch sells household items. Send each one what it sells. A slow branch is usually not short of customers. It is short of the right stock.

Move it, do not buy it

Before ordering more, look at what another branch has lying unsold. A shelf of taps sitting in one branch may be what another branch keeps asking for. Move it and record the move. Same goods, no new cost.

Put a value on the dead corner

When you see each branch's dead stock with the money attached and how long it has been lying, you can act. Discount it before it becomes worthless, move it to a branch where it sells, or return it to the supplier while he will still take it.

Stop buying items that lose money

When profit is shown for each item, you find the fast sellers that leave nothing after costs. Change the price, change the supplier, or stop pushing them. The busy counter becomes a profitable one.

Change the stock with the season, branch by branch

In the monsoon, send repair items to the market branch and hold back site goods from the bypass branch. Before Diwali, fill small paint tins and fittings where households buy. Each branch gets its own season.

Hold each manager to his own branch

Staff are tied to one branch and see only that branch. Every sale and every movement is stamped with the branch. A stock difference now belongs to one shop and one manager, and can be traced to the day.

Know a branch's true worth

Each branch's sales, stock and profit, seen on their own, tell you which branch to expand, which manager to back, and which shop is carrying the others.

Where you get ahead

Where your competitor keeps losing

Your tradesmen find everything in one place

Plumbers, painters and electricians go to the shop that never says no. When stock moves to where it is wanted, recorded and fast, your branches have the item more often than the shop down the road.

Your cash is not sitting in old finishes

Competitors discover dead stock at year end. You see it while the design still has buyers. Your money keeps turning while theirs sits on a shelf.

Your counter keeps billing when the line goes down

Billing carries on without internet and catches up when the connection returns. In the Diwali rush, when another shop's system stops, your queue keeps moving.

You grow branch by branch, not by guess

When you open the next branch, you already know which kind of customer each of your shops serves and what they buy. You stock the new one right from its first day.

The same season, with Vyavora

The story, told again

It is October again in Indore. Before the Diwali order, the owner opens Vyavora at the main shop and switches between his branches. He compares them item by item.

He sees that the bypass branch sold large paint tins and tanks all last season, while small tins sat. The colony branch sold small tins, door handles and lights fast, and its pipe fittings did not move. He orders for each branch what it sells. Before buying more taps, he sees a shelf of old-finish taps lying in the market shop for a long time, with its value next to it. He moves part of it to the colony branch, where households pick them for small repairs, and offers the rest at a discount.

In the Diwali rush, branches still send goods to each other, but every move is recorded. When the owner counts after the festival, each branch's stock matches. He can see the contractor's total dues across all branches in one place, and collects before the new year. He knows which branch made the most money, and it is not the one with the longest queue.

Why the others agree to it

Everyone in the chain is better off

For the branch manager

He sees only his own branch, so he is judged on his own shop and not blamed for another's mistakes. He can see what other branches hold and ask for a transfer that is recorded, instead of calling around and hoping. His dead stock and fast sellers are named for him, so he can push the right items.

For the owner's accountant

GST is kept for each branch and added up for filing. Every sale, purchase and transfer carries the branch it belongs to. Old bills and stock sheets in Excel or PDF are read in, not typed again. Year-end stock differences can be traced to a branch and a day.

For the counter staff

Finish, size and colour are picked at the counter, so the bill shows exactly what went out. Billing does not stop when the internet does.

What this does not do

Vyavora does not count your shelves for you; stock is only as true as what is billed, bought and moved through it. It does not run the paint tinting machine or record each shade mixed. It does not track batches or individual pieces. It does not plan deliveries to sites or track the boy on the scooter. It does not tell you what will sell next season. It shows each branch's stock, sales and profit clearly, as it happens, so you can decide.

Straight answers

Questions people in this trade ask

We have an enormous number of small items. Do we have to enter them all by hand?

No. Vyavora reads the files you already keep, such as Excel stock sheets and PDF bills, so the item list does not have to be typed again.

Can my branch staff see other branches' sales?

No. Staff are tied to one branch and see only that branch. You, as owner, can see each branch and all of them together.

We send goods between branches all day. Will that be a headache?

Each transfer is recorded when it is made. The goods leave one branch's stock and arrive in the other's, so the books match at the end of the season.

Can it handle taps in different finishes and paint in different pack sizes?

Yes. Details such as size, finish and colour can be picked at the billing counter, so each one is sold and counted as what it is.

What happens when the internet goes off in the middle of the rush?

Billing carries on without internet and catches up when the connection returns.

Can we remind contractors about their dues?

You can see what each customer owes and reach customers on WhatsApp from Vyavora.

Every branch has the item the customer wants. Just not the branch he walked into.