How Horsleys gave their managing director 350+ hours a year back.
Stock forecasting ran on one enormous spreadsheet that only the managing director could maintain, at six or seven hours a week. We replaced it with a stock app that pulls everything together on its own.
Founder hours reclaimed
350+
Six to seven hours of manual data entry a week, handed back to the managing director.
Manual data entry
Zero
The stock app pulls everything together on its own and needs no maintenance.
- Client
- Horsleys
- Industry
- Airline cabin products
- Team size
- 4 people
- What we built
- Inventory planning software
- Time to delivery
- 3 weeks
Real feedback from Horsleys
Hear Nick on getting his week back from a spreadsheet only he could run.
“It's like a full-time member of the team that doesn't need paying.”
Nick Carnall
Managing Director · Horsleys
Supplying the world's airlines since 1988.
Horsleys International supplies airlines with cabin products — soap, air fresheners, paper products, and chemical products. As Nick puts it, anything you see on an aircraft that isn't for sale on the trolley is something they would probably supply.
They are unusual in being both wholesaler and manufacturer, running UK and European manufacturing sites for wipes and liquid filling alongside a 3,000-pallet warehouse.
Their customers are the airlines themselves — British Airways, Ryanair, easyJet, KLM, Swiss, Iberia, TUI, SAS and Jet2 among them — and their products are approved by Boeing and AMS.
1988
Founded
3,000
Pallet warehouse
12+
Airlines supplied
A spreadsheet only one person could run.
Horsleys planned stock in a single large Excel workbook, fed by hand from several places at once. Current stock came out of Unleashed, their ERP. Sales figures were typed in from every invoice as it went out. Lead times and component lists for in-house products lived there too.
Unleashed could show what was in stock, what was on order, and what had been invoiced that month. What it could not do was tell them what they would need over the next three to six months, which is the question the whole business turns on.
That left six or seven hours a week of pure data entry — and in a business of four, it fell to Nick, because working out future demand meant knowing lead times, components, and where sales were heading. At the time he was the only person who held all of it.
It was fragile, too. One digit out could mean serious overstock or understock, and in a business where a large order can ship in days, the sheet could be out of date almost as soon as it was filled in. Two off-the-shelf tools had been demoed and neither could do the calculations.
It was a real drain on my time, taking me away from the key areas where I could be moving the needle of the business. I was just stuck with this horrendous data task.
Nick CarnallManaging Director, HorsleysProperly bespoke, not nearly bespoke.
We started narrow, proved it worked, and only then built the thing that replaced the spreadsheet outright.
One automation first
The engagement began with a small automation tying two of Horsleys' systems together. It worked well and it landed quickly, which is what made the case for going further — evidence rather than a pitch.
The stock app, live in 3 weeks
From there we built what Horsleys call their stock app: one source of truth that pulls from Unleashed automatically and presents stock levels, lead times, and requirements in a single dashboard, laid out the way they actually need to read it.
One source of truth
Everything arrives in one place on its own. No re-keying invoices, no stitching together exports from different systems.
Forecasting that works
Forecasts built from what happened last year, adjustable in a click, with different scenarios run three to six months out.
Built-in KPIs
Custom amendments since launch now surface KPIs for parts of the business that previously had no visibility at all.
Changes measured in hours
New customer scenarios and new products keep arriving, and the system has to move with them. Amendments have landed within the hour — and, in Nick's words, the fix always stays fixed.
A second stage, already underway
Working alongside the business surfaced inefficiencies neither of us had scoped at the start. A second phase automating more of the operation is now in progress.
The problem with some companies that offer bespoke is you still don't really get a bespoke system — you just get something they've created. What's different here is you can properly bespoke it to your daily function. It fits you perfectly, like a glove.
Nick CarnallManaging Director, HorsleysThe week that went back to the business.
The data entry is gone, the risk of a mistyped figure with it, and the managing director's time is back where it does the most good.
Founder hours reclaimed
350+
Six to seven hours a week of senior time, previously spent moving numbers between a spreadsheet and an ERP.
Ongoing maintenance
None
The stock app pulls the data in by itself. No re-keying, no reconciliation, and no chance of a mistyped figure driving an overstock.
“Having a joined-up system that's working for you is a huge part of being able to switch off. You don't have to worry about spending time gathering information — it's presented to you, so you can make quicker decisions. That has a real value.”
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