ERP Business Analyst in Bristol

Why drinks producers around Bristol need their own requirements

The countryside around Bristol has a long cider tradition, from Somerset villages to the Gloucestershire vale, and many producers still press fruit from their own orchards or from growers nearby. Inside the city, small breweries work from industrial units and converted buildings, distilleries make gin and other spirits, and importers and merchants carry on a trade in wine that the port has handled for generations. Each of these businesses turns raw materials into liquid, holds that liquid for a while, packages it in several formats and sells it to pubs, shops, distributors and the public.

Off-the-shelf ERP templates are written for manufacturers that make a product and ship it within days. Drinks production breaks that assumption in several ways at once. Intake is seasonal and sometimes paid for long after delivery. Work in progress can sit in tanks for many months while its volume and strength change. Blending combines several lots into one. Duty is calculated when product leaves duty suspension rather than when it is made, and a large part of what goes out travels in containers you expect back.

Unless these rules are captured before platforms are compared, demos will show a tidy manufacturing flow that bears little resemblance to your cellar or brewhouse. My first task is to capture them in plain language with the people who run production, finance and the trade accounts. VAT, Making Tax Digital and other national topics belong to my requirements work across the UK, and sector context sits on the UK food and beverage ERP page.

From orchard and grain store to tank: intake, maturation and blending

Cider and perry makers face a concentrated intake season each autumn. Fruit arrives by the trailer load from many growers, often across several varieties of bittersweet and bittersharp apples or perry pears, and the price may depend on variety, quality and the terms agreed with each grower. The requirements need to say how a delivery is weighed and recorded, how quality observations at the press are captured, and how growers are paid, whether on delivery, at the end of the season or in installments.

Once pressed or brewed, the liquid becomes work in progress that does not behave like ordinary stock. Volume changes through racking, filtration and evaporation. Strength is measured and recorded. A single vat may hold juice from many deliveries, and a finished product may be a blend of several vats from different seasons. Brewers run shorter cycles but face similar questions about fermentation vessels, conditioning tanks and transfers, and distillers add casks that are filled, sampled and drawn over long periods.

I write requirements for vessel records, transfers and losses, and for lot genealogy that lets you trace a bottle or keg back to the vessels and, where it matters, the growers or ingredient lots behind it. That trace is exactly what a recall, a customer complaint or an organic inspection will test. The fit-gap work then shows which platforms model vessels and blends natively and which would need configuration or an add-on, as described on the ERP gap analysis page.

Duty suspension, duty points and the figures your advisor needs

Alcohol duty shapes the stock records of every producer and importer, and it is where a weak specification causes the most expensive rework. Product can generally be held in duty suspension at approved premises, with duty becoming payable when it is released for consumption. The system therefore has to know, for every movement, whether stock is suspended or duty-paid, and it has to record the strength and volume that duty is calculated on.

The requirements in this area cover:

• Stock status by location, so suspended and duty-paid goods are never mixed in reports.
• The event that creates a duty point, such as dispatch to a customer or a transfer to your own shop or tasting room.
• Losses, spoilt product and returns from customers, and how each affects what is due.
• The data needed for duty returns, by product category and strength.
• Any reliefs your advisor says apply, for example for small producers or draught products, and the records each depends on.

I do not give duty advice. The rules have been reformed in recent years and the detail depends on your products and approvals, so your advisor and HMRC guidance decide the treatment. I make sure each confirmed rule becomes a numbered requirement and a test case, the approach my requirements gathering service sets out.

Kegs, casks and the pub trade

Selling to pubs, bars and restaurants means sending out containers that belong to you. Kegs and casks tie up real capital, they move between your site, wholesalers and outlets, and some never come back. Many smaller producers track them on a whiteboard or a spreadsheet, which holds up until the fleet grows or a distributor starts handling deliveries.

Requirements here cover how each container is identified, whether by serial number, barcode or simply by type and count; how it is issued against a delivery; whether the customer pays a deposit or the container is logged against the account; how empties are collected and credited; how cleaning and maintenance are recorded; and when an overdue container is written off or charged. The analysis should also decide where this belongs. Some ERPs handle returnable containers well, others need an add-on, and a dedicated tracking service may suit a large fleet better.

Trade customers bring further rules: price lists by outlet type, wholesaler agreements, delivery days for city-center venues and minimum order sizes. Direct sales through a taproom, a farm shop or an online store add their own stock locations, duty-paid transfers and till integrations. Each rule is written as a requirement with an owner and then exercised in a test script, as described on my ERP testing and UAT page.

Organic records, and analysis that respects the season

Bristol is home to the Soil Association, and organic production is a visible part of the region's food and drink economy. Producers holding organic certification keep records their certification body can inspect: what was bought from whom and with what status, how organic and non-organic materials were kept apart, how much went into and came out of each process, and which products were sold as organic. An ERP can hold much of this, but only if organic status is designed into item, supplier and lot records rather than typed into a notes field.

I document these requirements with the person responsible for certification and check them against the records your inspector asks for. Your certification body remains the authority on what must be kept.

Timing the analysis matters as much as its content. Pressing season and the run-up to the festive trade are the worst moments to ask production staff for workshops, so interviews and walkthroughs are planned for quieter months. Sessions stay short, and recorded video of the press house, brewhouse or bottling line lets the team show a process instead of describing it. Everything runs remotely, with shared documents for comment and written sign-off by process area; a site visit is possible by arrangement when it adds something. For the city's other sectors, see the Bristol ERP consultant page.