Shortlist UK’s Best Food and Beverage ERP Software

Meet your recipe, inventory, traceability, and food safety requirements by shortlisting Food and Beverage ERP for your manufacturing & distribution processes.

What Is Food and Beverage ERP Software?

Food and Beverage ERP Software is a specialised enterprise resource planning system designed for food manufacturers and distributors. It consolidates all production and distribution data in one system, improving collaboration and efficiency throughout the entire food and beverage manufacturing processes.

On top of standard modules like accounting and inventory management, Food and Beverage ERP provides unique modules like recipe management, food quality control, allergen management, and lot traceability. Using specific modules, food manufacturers can:

• Gain end-to-end product, batch, and lot traceability to facilitate recalls
• Track allergen and nutritional information
• Calculate weight/catch weight
• Reduce waste with First-Expired First-Out (FEFO) distribution and expiration date management
• Schedule crop and livestock yields for maximum optimisation of produce
• Automate and schedule food safety testing
• Balance consumer demand with production date, shelf life, and holding costs
• Avoid stockouts and overstocking with demand forecasting

Implementing Food and Beverage ERP Software helps diversify supply chains, target new food habits, and tighten existing manufacturing and distribution processes. This ensures a higher likelihood of survival for companies in the food and beverage industry. It slashes finished goods inventory by up to 25%, reduces time spent picking and packing by 10%, and increases delivery times by 14%.

Although food and beverage manufacturing generates £29 billion annually for the UK economy, investment growth has fallen by 30%. To combat climate change, recalls, labour shortages, and waste, food manufacturers need to be forward-thinking by adopting technologies such as food and beverage ERPs.

Best Food and Beverage ERP Software Options In the UK

Why Food and Beverage Manufacturers Implement ERP Software

There are four leading factors why food manufacturers implement Food and Beverage ERP Software:

1. Scale food and beverage production
2. Diversify supply chains
3. Target new food habits
4. Reduce recalls and waste

1. Scalability of Production & Distribution

A Food and Beverage ERP system is a single end-to-end platform that centralises all business processes from payroll and HR to order and inventory. Unlike applications such as Microsoft Office, QuickBooks, and Excel Spreadsheets, which can stunt growth opportunities for SMBs, the scalable possibilities of food & beverage ERP seem limitless.

2. Management of a Diverse Supply Chain

Diversifying your supply chain may seem complex, considering the amount of information and documents required. However, a Food and Beverage ERP is designed for this type of complexity. It provides food and beverage manufacturers with:

• Automation: Schedule the placement of orders based on thresholds such as forecasted demand and optimal yield time.
• Quick order placement: Having access to order demand forecasts and real-time warehouse stock levels (using IoT sensors), procurement managers can quickly and easily order raw materials on demand.
• Sustainable calculations: With AI-powered ERP solutions, you can easily understand if one supplier is better than another in terms of sustainability scores and make quicker decisions based on automated recommendations.

3. Meeting Changing Food Habits & Entering New Markets

An opportune way to combat the rising costs of raw materials is to expand and enter into new markets. Through Food and Beverage ERP modules such as Recipe and Formula Management, manufacturers can tweak recipes and introduce new ingredients to do just that.

Addressing new food habits and allergens includes producing products that are vegan-friendly, dairy-free, gluten-free, preservative-free, and generally more health-conscious.

4. Reduce Wastage, Recalls & Spoiled Goods

This is where an enterprise resource planning system shines. With applications for inventory, warehouse, and traceability management, food and beverage manufacturers can avoid huge losses.

Through on-demand forecasting and real-time inventory management, overstocking and understocking issues are addressed. With proper expiration date management and on-demand labelling systems (as well as FEFO distribution practices), the risk of spoiled goods is dramatically reduced.

Unique ERP Features For Food Manufacturing and Distribution Stages

ERP for the food and beverage industry is packed full of specific features that target the eight stages of manufacturing and distribution:

1. Raw Material Sourcing & Storing
2. Pre-Process Planning
3. Mixing and Formulation
4. Processing
5. Packaging
6. Finished Good Storage
7. Delivery and Distribution
8. Returns

1. Raw Material Sourcing & Storing

• Procurement Management: Automate contract tracking, supplier management, and purchase orders.
• Supplier Management: Communicate with suppliers and track certificates, regulatory documents, and material quality.
• Product Traceability: Automate the recording of material origins and batch details for compliance.
• Inventory Management: Store and track batch numbers, stock levels, and expiry dates as raw materials arrive.
• Warehouse Management System (WMS): Manage product locations, stock rotation for FEFO, and temperature control.
• Quality Control/Inspection: Track the quality of accepted raw materials, including those that have been rejected.

2. Pre-Process Planning

• Planning and Scheduling: Food and Beverage ERPs help allocate resources and raw materials ready for processing.
• Batch Management: Manage batches and ingredients for lot traceability and compliance.
• Equipment Maintenance Scheduling: Schedule maintenance to ensure equipment is ready for processing and runs.

3. Mixing and Formulation

• Recipe Management: Automate ingredient ratios, revisions, and production costs for each batch.
• Batch Management: Automate batch creation, mixing sequences, and the use of raw materials and ingredients, allocating unique identifiers.
• Quality Control: Monitor the consistency of ingredients to ensure compliance with product specifications.

4. Processing

• Process Monitoring: Automate alerts and notifications for cooking times and temperatures.
• Quality Assurance: Use real-time data input to ensure compliance with safety standards (HACCP, FSA).
• Traceability: Record processing stages for each batch number.

5. Packaging

• Packaging Management: Source and track packaging materials, quantity, and labels.
• Label Tagging: Ensure information regarding ingredients and nutritional data align with the correct batch.
• Batch and Lot Tracking: Assign packing details with batch numbers for recall readiness.

6. Finished Good Storage

• Finished Goods Inventory: Input and monitor stock levels with expiry dates and storage conditions with your Food and Beverage ERP.
• Warehouse Management System: Track and manage locations, storage temperatures, and shipping readiness.
• Shelf Life Management: Automate alerts for when products are near expiring and trigger price alterations.

7. Delivery and Distribution

• Order Management: Track and process customer orders, invoices, and delivery schedules.
• Transportation and Logistics: Plan and optimise delivery routes while maintaining shipping conditions like temperature.
• Sales and CRM: Manage customer data, SLAs, and post-sale customer service.

8. Returns

• Returns Management: Record and track customer returns while automating refunds or replacements.
• Reverse Logistics: Coordinate transportation for collecting and returning finished goods.
• Inventory Management: Update stock levels when returned goods are received (if they’re undamaged and non-perishable).
• Quality Control: Inspect and automate corrective actions for returned finished goods.

What Operations Benefit Most From Implementing Food and Beverage ERP?

Industry-specific ERP Software is aimed at various operations within the food and drink sectors, such as:

• Dairy
• Meat, poultry, and fish
• Breweries
• Beverage bottlers
• Bakery and confectionery
• Fresh produce
• Farming and agriculture
• Frozen and prepared foods
• Canned goods
• Ingredients (such as spices)

Budget and ROI Considerations When Purchasing Food and Beverage ERP Software

The cost of implementing Food and Beverage ERP Software ranges from £15,000 to £500,000. This drastic variation in cost comes down to the number of users, the modules required, the size of the organisation, and the vendor.

In general, companies that successfully implement an ERP system see a return on their investment within the first 2.5 years. For companies in the food and beverage industry, ROI will be in the form of:

• Reducing handling costs and waste
• Increasing capacity by automating manual processes like batch tracking and inventory management
• Reducing time and labour spent on audit and reporting with automated traceability and compliance tracking
• Less rush orders with demand forecasting

Using ERP For Food and Beverage to Combat Industry Challenges

Although food and beverage manufacturing generates £29 billion annually for the UK economy, investment growth has fallen by 30%. To combat climate change, recalls, labour shortages, and waste, food manufacturers need to be forward-thinking by adopting technologies such as food and beverage software.

Three leading challenges are leading the charge for Food and Beverage ERP Software implementation.

1. Rising Costs of Raw Materials For Manufacturing

In the year leading up to March 2024, food production costs increased by 9.2%, with a further 2.1% increase expected by 2025. The reasons behind this increase include inflation, soaring energy costs, and the rising cost of raw materials.

This increase in raw material costs is a combination of factors:

• Climate change
• Material shortage
• Labour shortage
• Geopolitical tensions
• Transportation / Production delays and halts

Coupled with soaring energy costs for running production machinery and equipment, profit margins for food and beverage manufacturers continue to shrink.

2. Ensuring Food Safety Standards & Compliance

From procurement and manufacturing of raw materials to labelling and inventory management, processes impacting safety, transparency, and traceability should be of the highest standard. Failure to do so can result in revenue and brand-crippling consequences, such as enforced product recalls.

Product recalls can single-handedly put produce manufacturers out of business. Studies have put the cost of food recalls between $1 million and $10 million in direct costs.

Beyond finances, manufacturers risk damaging brand reputations that have taken decades to build and losing the trust of a loyal consumer base.

Food and beverage sectors are heavily regulated in terms of safety, compliance, and transparency. Businesses need to obtain food safety certifications (such as HACCP, GMP+, FSSC 22000, and BRCGS) to demonstrate compliance with the highest safety standards. There are also food safety checklists to follow, like the one provided by the UK’s Food Standards Agency.

3. Meeting Sustainability Expectations

The demand for sustainable practices in food and beverage production is at an all-time high. Sustainability in food production and manufacturing has been at the forefront of Net Zero targets among the UN, Climate Action 100+ investors, and the Paris Climate Agreement.

In 2015, the food and beverage industry alone accounted for 34% of all human-caused greenhouse gas emissions (as a result of the ‘food system’ supply chain that includes agriculture, transport, fuel production, waste management, industrial packaging, farming, and livestock production).

In the UK, the food and drink sector is responsible for 22% (158 million tonnes) of its carbon footprint.

Expectations for companies to meet set sustainability targets going forward include:

• Sourcing raw materials locally
• Reducing waste
• Using renewable energy sources for transportation and manufacturing (such as electric vehicles and HGVs)
• Using recycled packaging
• Procure lower-carbon materials/ingredients
• Improving manufacturing energy consumption (sustainable refrigerants, renewable electricity, etc.)

How 3 Companies Successfully Applied Food and Beverage ERP Software

Case Study #1: Undercover Snacks

The New Jersey-based company needed a Food and Beverage ERP to support its rapid growth. Other key reasons included gaining better control over inventory, financial planning, and the production process. They chose to transition from QuickBooks and implement Oracle NetSuite. By doing so, they:

• Automated reconciliations, forecasting, and financial reporting that reduced error rates
• Improved decision-making through visibility by connecting customer, supplier, producer, and warehouse data
• Scaled into 10,000 stores globally and into new channels like United Airlines

Case Study #2: Heaven Hill Distilleries

A Kentucky-based producer of distilled spirits that deployed IFS integrated ERP systems in 2003. The reasons for this implementation were to enhance data accessibility and improve key decision-making. This resulted in:

• Reduced finished goods inventory
• Improved agility in a changing market
• Shortened lead times with faster order fulfilment
• Faster decision-making with real-time data insights

Case Study #3: KLN Family Brands

KLN, a manufacturer of human and pet food products, implemented IFS Food and Beverage ERP to meet the surging customer demand. They required greater supply chain and MRP visibility after outgrowing their current ERP solution. KLN’s ROI looked like this:

• Reduced finished goods inventory by 25% with enhanced forecasting capabilities
• Cut raw materials inventory by $2 million within six months
• Reduced spending on maintenance and additional applications by condensing and integrating operational data

Food and Beverage ERP Software FAQs

How Long Does ERP Implementation Take For Food and Beverage Operations?

ERP implementation time varies based on the scope of the project, but the average timeline ranges between 6 and 18 months. Implementation should be considered an ongoing process, not static. It’s important to have a detailed implementation plan in place to avoid implementation failure. Generally, food manufacturers and distributors have a good implementation success rate of 67%.

How Is Food and Beverage ERP Different From Other ERP Systems?

Food and beverage ERP systems include specialised features for manufacturing and distribution processes. That means, on top of general ERP features like accounting, it has features for lot traceability, allergen management, shelf-life monitoring, HACCP compliance, recipe scaling, and batch control.

Can Food and Beverage ERP Handle Product Recalls?

Yes, modern food ERPs enable end-to-end traceability of ingredients and finished goods. That means you can isolate affected batches and quickly carry out a recall.

What Systems Can Food and Beverage ERP Integrate With?

Food ERP platforms can integrate with warehouse management systems (WMS), accounting software, CRM, e-commerce platforms or POS systems, and inventory tracking systems (like RFID or barcode tools).

What Deployment Methods Are Available for ERP Food and Beverage Systems?

There are two obvious deployment methods of ERP Software: cloud and on-premise. On-premise food and beverage ERP systems are favoured by larger organisations with strict data control. Cloud-based ERP systems offer more flexibility and scalability, while having lower upfront costs and greater update opportunities.