International B2B E-Business & E-Procurement

for ratioform Packaging

Germany's market leader

in the trade of packaging for shipping, warehousing and offices

11 locations

in 5 European countries

300

staff members

100,000 m²

Storage area throughout Europe for fast availability

Awards

2 x Best OnlineShop B2B in 2007

20 Years

Customer of ICONPARC from 2001-2021

Ratioform Packaging

Ratioform Verpackungen GmbH is Germany's market leader in the trade with packaging for shipping, warehousing and offices. The company has its headquarters in Pliening near Munich and is active throughout Europe with its B2B multi-channel sales strategy.

ratioform was founded in 1979 and as Packaging Solutions Group (PSG) is part of the TAKKT EUROPE division of TAKKT AG, the leading B2B mail order specialist for business equipment with headquarters in Stuttgart and around three million customers in 25 countries.

The Challenge
  • Implementation of a multi-channel strategy in which sales and marketing use all sales channels, i.e. the Internet in addition to print, e-mail and telephone. The B2B webshop channel is to be established as the most effective lead generation platform.

  • The structurally sophisticated print catalogue should also be implemented online. Ratioform catalogue data are complex due to the wide range of price scales and the partly customer-specific prices. In addition, there is multilingualism, multi-layered feature and variant systematics (e.g. "double-wall cardboard" in many sizes), vouchers and a premium program. In addition, each country has a specific assortment. All this has to be represented within the framework of the B2B platform.

  • The unique selling propositions of ratioform include uncompromising quality and high processing speed in addition to intensive customer service. By introducing a B2B e-Business platform, the company hopes to meet these high demands even better. Automation and the reduction of media breaks to a minimum should lead to even faster and error-free order processing.

  • Introduction of an international intranet with the aim of offering employees a comprehensive information platform that optimizes internal communication.

  • The integration of the international B2B e-Business solution into the existing IT infrastructure includes in particular connections to several merchandise management systems and the central product information management (PIM) for all countries.

It's perfect!

Cartons made to measure with one click

The Solution
  • Several awards as best B2B Webshop

  • The international B2B e-Business platform makes a significant contribution to the increase in total turnover

  • Highly efficient content maintenance without "link corpses". When generating leads via search engines, there is no second chance. If a link leads to nothing, the prospective customer does not torch for long and becomes a customer of the next provider. The ICONPARC B2B e-Business solution automatically adapts links to changes; link inconsistencies are thus prevented.

  • With a volume of several 10,000 pages and links, it is also important to keep the maintenance effort under control. The seamless integration of e-Business, catalogue management and editorial system (CMS) makes content maintenance very efficient. Only one Content Manager is required for all countries and more than 10,000 pages - and that for the administration of the entire content. The system is fast, efficient and error-free.

  • Editorial pages and content are created in several languages without involving a website developer. Layout and design are automatically designed to be consistent.

E-Procurement
Functional Highlights
  • One central B2B e-Business platform, any number of country-specific webshop instances

  • Convenient search and filter mechanism: automatic search suggestions (Auto Suggest), dynamic filters that adapt to the context (after-search navigation), error tolerance for typing errors

  • Dimensionally tolerant carton search with intelligent alternative suggestions in the event that a customer prefers the favourable standard range and is prepared to make a compromise on fitting accuracy

  • Customized carton production, i.e. the customer can order an individual product online even though it is not stored in the merchandise management system.

  • Accelerated ordering process (QuickOrder): Based on orders from the past, the B2B e-Business platform determines customer-specific favorites, which can be reordered with a single click; the order history also supports fast reordering, since articles and quantities are prefilled, and therefore only changes have to be entered again. This is especially helpful for many item positions.

  • Selection of instant gifts and bonus points depending on the net value of the items in the shopping basket

  • Handling of different types of vouchers (value, percentage, time-limited vouchers)

  • Display of individual prices for selected commercial customers

  • Connection to merchandise management systems: Customer and order data as well as price lists are always uniform in all subsystems; customer duplicates due to multiple registrations are recognized and resolved.

  • Comprehensive catalog data interface to Product Information Management (connection to external PIM)

  • Intranet with a wide range of information for internal employees, such as sales guides, product information, legal information (e.g. on the Packaging Ordinance), marketing downloads, internal job exchange, frequently asked questions, dates and much more.

2 awards
as best OnlineShop B2B
Whitepapers
Customer Testimonials