Video Testimonial
Our partnership with Sellercloud has allowed me to sleep at night knowing my employees have a system that can cover our e-commerce needs, both today and in the future.
CEO, CPG.IO
CPG.IO
Client since: 2021
Uses: Sellercloud, Skustack
Industry: 3PL – Third Party Logistics
Founded: 2012
Headquarters: Addison, IL
Company size: 130-150 employees
Types of items sold: 3PL service working with over 200 brands.
“Our partnership with Sellercloud has allowed me to sleep at night knowing my employees have a system that can cover our e-commerce needs, both today and in the future.”
John Holby, CEO, CPG.IO
Before Sellercloud
The success story that is CPG.IO started in 2012 in Bensenville in a 10,000 sq ft warehouse. A 3PL, CPG.IO describes themselves as a ‘one-stop shop for e-commerce.’ As CEO John Holby says, “We do distribution, we do third-party logistics, we do marketing.” He explains that their goal is to help e-commerce brands achieve their dreams and take them beyond that and into the future.
CPG.IO had humble beginnings. In the early days, they worked primarily with groceries, taking products from local distributors and selling them online. It was an easier time, and CPG.IO didn’t have to worry about a two-day turnaround or handling multiple vendors.
However, CPG.IO realized that some brands sold better than others, and this was when business really began to transform. “We would reach out to them directly, and we would start a direct partnership,” said Holby. Brands recognized the value CPG.IO could provide, and they began selling their services. Focusing on brands enabled CPG.IO to grow exponentially, and soon, it moved from a 10,000 sq ft warehouse to an enormous 150,000 sq ft warehouse. Then Covid hit, and the business exploded as more consumers started to purchase online.
Some of the biggest US brands CPG.IO works with include Kraft Heinz, Campbell’s, Nestlé, SC Johnson, Rubbermaid, and Newell.
The Challenge
With things going so well with CPG.IO, it’s almost surprising to hear they encountered any challenges at all. However, their previous e-commerce solution was getting in the way of growth. “We basically outgrew our previous system,” summarized Sharon Leckron, Senior Vice President of Channel Development of CPG.IO.
CPG.IO had plenty of grievances related to their previous solution. For starters, not only was it not giving them the data they needed as consistently as they needed it, its reporting features were not working properly, producing duplicates and unnecessary columns. “We needed a solution where we could get good, concise data so that we could report against it,” says Holby.
Another significant limitation CPG.IO faced was difficulty adding additional channels to the software. “They were designed more for if you had one Amazon Seller Central channel or one Shopify channel,” says Leckron. CPG.IO was handling multiple clients working on multiple channels—a challenge the software just wasn’t suitable for—and they also could not trace changes made to their listing from different users, leading to all sorts of confusion. The cherry on top? Their previous solution wasn’t cloud-based either, meaning it could not be accessed from different machines in sync with each other, and it was expensive per transaction.
The Solution
Finding Sellercloud was a sigh of relief for CPG.IO, and they went live in September 2021. Holby notes how Sellercloud had many integrations they had yet to adopt, and they could see how CPG.IO could grow rapidly with Sellercloud in the near future as it had many practical features they needed. Holby also found that Sellercloud was an excellent solution cost-wise as well. “Sellercloud is a great solution because as we grow, the cost stays rather static,” said Holby.
Managing listings instantly became easier for CPG.IO. Holby tells us how Sellercloud enables them to create listings faster, and having one place to store all their product information has been enormously helpful, especially when working with hundreds of clients, each with thousands of listings.
CPG.IO is impressed with how quickly Sellercloud has integrated many new marketplaces, allowing it to rapidly expand its reach. “We have the ability to integrate with new channels that didn’t even exist two to three years ago,” said Holby. CPG.IO was one of the first businesses to integrate TikTok Shop as part of Sellercloud’s early adoption and partnership. It has become one of their fastest-growing channels in multiple business segments. On top of that, CPG.IO has been able to add new Walmart Marketplace accounts for some of their client’s brands and utilize Vendor Central and Direct Fulfillment integrations to scale their automation capabilities, enabling them to offer additional services to their clients. Today, people often refer to CPG.IO’s services as that of a 5PL.
However, what really made a difference to CPG.IO was Sellercloud’s order management features. CPG.IO uses Sellercloud to connect all their sales channels and fulfill all their orders. Leckron tells us how Sellercloud’s open API helps make this even easier. “We are able to connect with our reporting partner, and connect with our shipping software and other systems a lot easier than our previous platform,” explained Leckron. CPG.IO could now get data where it needed to go, automating processes and enabling them to make informed decisions.
Leckron appreciated how much easier and more user-friendly Sellercloud is than their previous solution. “We have been able to get data a lot faster and a lot more accurately than our previous system. I like seeing the visibility into the changelog,” said Leckron, who also notes that she now has more visibility on their e-commerce operations and can easily see the change history of different listings, for example. CPG.IO can also perform complex actions independently without contacting Sellercloud for assistance. “We are able to set up multiple different warehouses very easily by ourselves,” said Leckron, “that has made it a lot easier to segment different 3PL customers and different projects that we have to do in multiple warehouses.” Before, it was impossible to divide their customers’ inventory this way.
The customization Sellercloud offers has also been a game changer for CPG.IO. CPG.IO was able to mold Sellercloud’s customizable interface to the unique needs of their business, in this case, the businesses of over 200 leading brands. “I can scale my business in ways that I need, knowing that they’ll do the customized work to make it work for me,” said Holby.
Being able to customize Sellercloud meant CPG.IO could take its pricing strategy to a genius new level. They were able to set up a custom repricer in Sellercloud that could take into account other variables related to their business. “Essentially it adds in different fees such as packaging and labor and calculates that net cost. That then gets sent to our repricer to kind of help us stay competitive against different sellers on Amazon,” explained Leckron.
Another key feature that has enabled CPG.IO to take automation to another level is Sellercloud’s Order Rule Engine, which allows them to set up rules for specific actions. It has been particularly helpful for fraud prevention. “If an order comes in with a fraud tag, it goes into the problem order status, so that helps our customer service team manually review those orders and make sure they’re okay before we set them out,” said Leckron. CPG.IO also uses the Order Rule Engine for third-party shipping and billing to automatically add whatever information is needed.
CPG.IO also adopted Skustack, Sellercloud’s WMS (Warehouse Management System), to improve efficiency in the warehouse. Leckron was impressed by how Skustack uses mobile technology to scan products on the warehouse floor. She also appreciates how Skustack provides them with visibility so they can track workers in the warehouse and receiving and picking processes. Holby says it’s made employees more efficient because it doesn’t matter what channel they are sold on when they scan items. Instead, everything happens automatically—the channel is added to the order, as is the rate shopping, shipping label, and packing list. “That’s really sped things up to go down the line,” said Holby.
After Sellercloud
Sellercloud has enabled CPG.IO to reach its true potential and foster exponential growth. CPG.IO has grown from 50 employees to 130 to 150 employees today and now manages fulfillment, marketing, optimization services, and catalog for over 200 brands within Sellercloud. “Sellercloud allows us to grow, including almost doubling the number of channels that we used to be on in our previous system, as well as handling the increased amount of order flow and requirements,” summarized Leckron. She told us at the interview that they were expanding to several new channels. Holby adds that they are now able to handle 20,000 daily orders.
CPG.IO has felt 100% supported by Sellercloud. “[The] support with Sellercloud has been night and day versus our previous order management system,” said Leckron, who also mentioned that with their previous system, it could be multiple days before an urgent request got a response. “The support has been amazing. We meet regularly with a premium service rep as well as there’s a phone number to call if there’s an emergency, even after hours,” said Leckron.
Holby and Leckron recommend Sellercloud to other emerging e-commerce companies needing a serious e-commerce solution. “I am confident that Sellercloud can help us continue to grow with adding new channels and handling our additional order of volume,” said Leckron. Holby adds that no matter the size of your business, Sellercloud has all the tools you need. He finishes by saying, “Our partnership with Sellercloud has allowed me to sleep at night knowing my employees have a system that can cover our e-commerce needs, both today and in the future.”
