About Toolbank
Established in 1972, Toolbank has solidified its position as one of Europe's leading specialist distributors of building and home improvement products. With over 250 major brands and an inventory exceeding 30,000 SKUs and growing, boasting an 96% availability rate, Toolbank offers swift 24/7 delivery service across the UK and Ireland. The company's extensive network of regional offices and distribution centres enables them to provide tailored support, empowering customers to boost their sales efficiently.
Toolbank's success is rooted in providing their retail customers and suppliers with a competitive distribution service, an expansive product range, and a robust marketing package - all delivered with a personal and friendly touch.
The Challenge
Toolbank serves many major retailers and is dedicated to ongoing improvements in customer experiences. To achieve this, one strategy involved expanding customer access to their product range and highlighting long-tail products, thereby diversifying their client retail list.
Historically integrating with their retailers had mostly relied on manual processes and, therefore, could benefit from increased efficiency. Recognising the need for enhanced scalability, Toolbank sought a solution to streamline and optimize retailer integration procedures.
The Solution
Through Virtualstock, Toolbank is able to connect to multiple retailers using one Virtualstock API, rather than undergoing numerous client integrations. This, coupled with more efficient data validation through Virtualstock's Product Induction Module, delivers a faster time-to-market and reduces manual intervention, therefore enhancing the process.
The near real-time visibility of stock, order, and delivery status between Toolbank and its retailers through the Virtualstock Platform significantly reduced customer service queries.
Toolbank's partnership with Virtualstock has enhanced the relationships between Toolbank and their customers, as well as having a positive and significant impact on product expansion with its clients.
"We use the Virtualstock platform to process orders for several large retailers. We find it intuitive and easy to use; it allows us to scale the volume of orders we can process from a retailer, without adding manual processes"
Simon Oakes Head of Online Sales, Toolbank
