Hello Bello & SPS Commerce: Automating to support omnichannel growth

A fast-growing brand seeks supply chain efficiencies

Founded in 2019 by Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard, Hello Bello offers premium baby and personal care products at affordable prices. The company has grown exponentially and recently opened a distribution and manufacturing center in Waco, Texas.

Hello Bello sells its products through big-box retailers, including Walmart, CVS and Target, and through distributors to smaller co-ops and boutique shops. Hello Bello products are also available directly to consumers via the company’s website. 

Hello Bello has worked with SPS Commerce since the inception of the brand to automate order processing. According to Anthony Flores, Demand Planning and Analytics Manager, Hello Bello selected SPS because of its reliability and reputation in the retail industry. 

Building scale through automation

As Hello Bello’s growth accelerated, managing the increased order volume became a more significant challenge.

“After continuing to scale our business, we got to a point where there was additional workload associated with manually entering orders,” Flores said. “That’s when we decided to look for a new ERP system that would integrate with SPS Commerce because we had such a positive experience working with SPS.”

Before implementing the SPS integration, the Hello Bello team spent approximately 10 minutes manually entering each order. They received 120 orders or more each week from different retailers. Some orders included just a few items, while others included every item in the assortment. 

“We knew that we needed to automate to continue to support our growth,” Flores added. “We were looking for one holistic ERP and EDI solution that could take an order or order change into our system and automatically create a sales order.”

To streamline order processing, Hello Bello chose Microsoft Dynamics 365 as its ERP system. At the same time, they added System Automation capabilities with Dynamics 365 to their SPS Fulfillment (EDI) solution.

“SPS Fulfillment allows our ERP system to generate and transmit an order rather than manually typing the information into Excel from pick sheets,” he said. “In addition, automation removes the potential for human error. If we pack 100 units, we know 100 units made it onto the packing slip that we send to a retailer.”

In addition to making orders more efficient, the team has also improved the invoicing process. Previously, the accounting team spent 12 hours invoicing a single account: Walmart.

“We used to process invoices one at a time,” Flores continued. “Now, after an order is processed, the warehouse can close the order, and our system automatically generates an invoice. Thanks to our SPS integration, we feel comfortable that the invoice will be accurate. We no longer need to worry about invoices being on hold because of three-way match issues with our customers.”

A full-service experience

Hello Bello attributes a large part of the project’s success to the excellent support of the SPS Commerce team.

Duke Dizdar, Supply Chain Analyst at Hello Bello, works with EDI orders and ensures customers are set up for EDI automation. He appreciates the ability to use the in-product chat within Fulfillment or get on the phone with the SPS team.

“Our implementation with SPS Commerce has been quick, including all the mapping through go live,” said Dizdar. “The SPS team always takes the time to understand our needs. They have been phenomenal from start to finish. We really see them as an extension of the Hello Bello team.”

Further, the team values the ability to check data transmission files within Fulfillment Monitor. “With Fulfillment, none of our data is hidden,” said Flores. “We like to be hands-on with our data, and the complete transparency is very impactful to us. Rather than worrying about whether an EDI document was transmitted successfully, we can focus on optimizing our global supply chain.”

In the future, Hello Bello plans to further automate by adopting advance ship notices (ASNs) with more customers. This way, the picklist posted from a scan gun in the warehouse will also generate an ASN for trading partners. In addition, the company is automating order processing with its 3PLs and warehouse partners.

As Hello Bello continues to optimize its supply chain, the company appreciates how the SPS team helps it adapt to future retail requirements. 

“In this business, we don’t like surprises. We like to get orders in, get them on the dock and ship them out,” Flores concluded. “When retailers change requirements, we get a notification email in advance. We know a change is coming, so we can minimize disruption by coordinating the change with our project teams. Thanks to SPS, there’s never been a day when we come in and are surprised that a trading requirement has changed.”