Companies that jumped on the digital bandwagon early on don’t always find it easy to keep their systems up to date. The Vlaamse Oliecentrale (VOC), a family-owned SME from Herentals, experienced this firsthand. Its old MS-DOS programs were outdated and needed to be replaced with new, future-proof platforms.
Together with Alistar, VOC is now writing a new digital chapter with an ERP and CRM system, to which an online store will also be linked. “This brings us completely up to date and ready for the future,” says manager Jelle Pynaerts.
Alistar not only has the necessary expertise, but they also understand our business very well.
Jelle Pynaerts, Manager
A Fragmented Sales Landscape
The Vlaamse Oliecentrale was formed through the merger of three companies, which were acquired by Patrick Pynaerts in 2007. Today, his sons Maarten and Jelle are at the helm of the company. “On the one hand, we are a distributor of home heating oil for residential customers; on the other hand, we are a distributor of lubricants for businesses. Among other things, we are the main distributor for Shell in Flanders. We handle marketing, sales, and distribution for them,” says Jelle Pynaerts.
“One of our biggest challenges in this regard is that the sales landscape is becoming increasingly fragmented. In B2B lubricant sales, there are companies that still place orders by phone after seeing an advertisement. In addition, there are sales representatives who visit major customers for traditional sales. And we’ve also taken the first steps toward launching an online store to boost online sales and meet the demand for digital tools.”
Alistar: Proximity and Expertise
Years ago, the family-owned business had already invested in software to manage its operations. But a new digitization initiative became necessary. Jelle Pynaerts: “We had good systems back then, but the technology became outdated and support gradually dried up. That’s why we started looking for an IT service provider that could help us bring our processes up to date and make them more efficient. After conducting market research, we decided to partner with GMI (now part of Alistar). They’re based nearby and had developed a compelling proposal to combine a new ERP and CRM package. They have the necessary expertise, but they also understand our business very well.”
The Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central ERP suite proved to be the best fit for Vlaamse Oliecentrale. “It was immediately clear that this offered the right solution for the complexity of our business, which involves two very different customer groups—individuals and businesses—with separate sales processes and specific considerations regarding invoicing, excise taxes, and taxation. With Business Central, we were able to respond to these challenges easily and flexibly.”
Alistar’s experts conducted extensive interviews with our employees so they could identify exactly what our needs were and how those needs could be translated into digital processes. As a result, the implementation went smoothly.
“I’m thinking specifically of installment payments or fuel taxes. They also introduced us to the capabilities of Business Central, showed us some interesting tools, and guided us step by step through the entire implementation.”
Everything organized in a single workflow
For Hans Vangeel, a senior consultant at Alistar, this was a fascinating project. “We listened carefully to the challenges faced by Vlaamse Oliecentrale: a highly diverse product range on the one hand, a broad portfolio of customers on the other, and the complexity of the processes involved. Our task was to bring all of that together into a single solution in which both the ERP and CRM functionalities were integrated with the GeCommerce web store. So we consolidated all the applications onto a single cloud platform. Moreover, they work together seamlessly.”
The Cloud as a Stepping Stone to the Future
“We also saw the ability to work in the cloud as an advantage,” Pynaerts continues. “This way, we can be sure that we have a reliable and scalable system, that our programs are always up to date, and that we’ll be able to adapt to new technological developments—for example, in automation, machine learning, and artificial intelligence. Microsoft continues to be a trendsetter in this area.”
That vision for the future is important to VOC.
We want to become a phygital company and combine the best of the physical and digital worlds. In the future, communication will take place in whatever way the customer prefers: via digital files, a chatbot, or on paper, if desired.
“In addition, my dream is that our accounting could be fully automated, which would allow us to have our employees focus much more on interacting with and serving our customers. I also have high hopes for AI in this regard,” Jelle concludes.
