About HairBow Center
HairBow Center was founded in 2009 by husband-and-wife team Kristi and Trent Banwart with a vision to provide high-quality craft supplies to creative makers across America. What began as selling ribbons and craft supplies at local craft shows quickly evolved into an eBay business, and eventually a comprehensive multi-channel operation serving crafters through Amazon, their own eCommerce site, and multiple marketplace platforms.
The company's growth trajectory reflects the founders' entrepreneurial spirit and responsiveness to customer needs. Starting with a focused product line of ribbons, HairBow Center expanded to include elastics, headbands, flowers, and a diverse array of craft supplies—eventually growing to manage over 5,000 SKUs serving a passionate community of DIY crafters, small business owners, and creative hobbyists.
Over more than a decade of operation, HairBow Center has demonstrated remarkable adaptability—from their initial craft show roots to building a thriving online business, from ribbons to a full craft supply catalog, and even pivoting during COVID-19 to meet urgent demand for face mask supplies. This agility has been enabled by operational infrastructure that could scale and adapt as their business evolved.
The Challenge: Spreadsheet Chaos Threatening Growth
As HairBow Center's product catalog expanded to thousands of SKUs and their multi-channel operations grew more complex, the operational systems that had worked in the early years became critical bottlenecks threatening their ability to continue scaling.
Spreadsheet Systems Crashing Daily
HairBow Center's inventory and purchasing management relied heavily on increasingly complex spreadsheets that were simply overwhelmed by the scale of operations:
- Managing 5,000 SKUs across multiple suppliers in spreadsheets
- Files crashing daily as data volume exceeded spreadsheet capabilities
- Manual data entry creating opportunities for errors
- No real-time visibility into inventory levels
- Purchasing decisions made with outdated information
The daily crashes weren't just annoying—they consumed valuable time, created operational uncertainty, and represented real business risk when critical inventory data was inaccessible.
Failed Previous Technology Implementation
Recognizing the limitations of spreadsheets, HairBow Center had previously attempted to implement an ERP system—but the implementation failed after just 6 months. The experience left the team:
- Wary of complex enterprise software
- Concerned about implementation risk
- Uncertain whether technology could actually solve their problems
- Back to manual processes and spreadsheets
The failed implementation had consumed time, money, and team energy while delivering no lasting value. The team needed a solution that would actually work for their business.
Warehouse Without Product Locations
HairBow Center's warehouse operations lacked systematic organization:
- No specific product locations or warehouse management system
- Pickers searching for products without guidance
- Inefficient fulfillment workflows
- Difficult to train new warehouse staff
- Time wasted locating products
Without proper warehouse management, fulfillment was slower and more error-prone than necessary—directly impacting customer satisfaction and operational costs.
Purchasing Process Taking Weeks
Managing purchasing across thousands of SKUs and multiple suppliers was an extraordinarily time-consuming manual process:
"It took us days and weeks to do our purchasing tasks which, in Fulfil, take a matter of hours."
— Trent Banwart, CEO, HairBow Center
The purchasing workflow involved:
- Manually reviewing inventory levels in spreadsheets
- Identifying products needing reorder
- Checking multiple suppliers for each product
- Creating purchase orders manually
- Tracking shipments and updating expected inventory
The weeks-long purchasing cycle meant HairBow Center was always behind—reacting to stockouts rather than proactively managing inventory. The manual process also prevented taking advantage of supplier deals or responding quickly to demand changes.
Limited Multi-Channel Capabilities
As HairBow Center expanded beyond eBay to include Amazon, Shopify, and other marketplaces, managing inventory and orders across channels became increasingly complex:
- Manual inventory allocation across channels
- Risk of overselling when inventory wasn't synchronized
- Different order management processes for each channel
- Difficult to optimize inventory investment across channels
- Limited visibility into channel-specific performance
The channel complexity limited HairBow Center's ability to expand into additional marketplaces or optimize their existing channel mix.
Unsustainable Manual Processes
The combination of manual purchasing, warehouse operations without location management, spreadsheet-based inventory tracking, and disconnected channel management created an operational model that simply couldn't scale:
- Team spending countless hours on manual data entry and coordination
- Growth requiring proportional increases in operational headcount
- High risk of errors as complexity increased
- Leadership time consumed by operational firefighting
- Strategic initiatives delayed by operational demands
The manual processes weren't just inefficient—they threatened HairBow Center's ability to continue growing profitably.
Inability to Respond to Market Opportunities
When unexpected opportunities arose—like the surge in demand for face mask supplies during COVID-19—HairBow Center's systems made it difficult to respond quickly. The manual processes and spreadsheet-based planning meant:
- Slow decision-making based on outdated data
- Difficulty ramping up purchasing quickly
- Challenges coordinating fulfillment of new product lines
- Limited ability to optimize operations for changed circumstances
Operational agility required better systems.
The Solution: Purpose-Built ERP for Craft Supply Operations
HairBow Center partnered with Fulfil to implement a comprehensive ERP platform that would eliminate manual processes, provide real-time visibility, and enable continued growth. After the failed previous implementation, the team approached the project carefully—but found Fulfil's craft-supply-friendly approach and proven track record convincing.
Centralized Inventory Management
Fulfil replaced HairBow Center's crashing spreadsheets with a robust, centralized inventory management system:
- Real-time inventory visibility across all 5,000+ SKUs
- Accurate tracking across warehouse, in-transit, and allocated inventory
- Automated inventory updates as orders placed and shipments received
- No more daily crashes or lost data
- Accessible inventory data for all teams
The centralized inventory management provided the single source of truth that spreadsheets could never deliver.
Purpose-Built Purchasing Application
One of the most transformative capabilities: Fulfil's purchasing application designed specifically for businesses like HairBow Center managing thousands of SKUs across multiple suppliers:
- Automated reorder point alerts based on actual usage patterns
- Streamlined purchase order creation with intelligent suggestions
- Vendor management consolidating supplier information
- Shipment tracking from PO creation through receipt
- Expected inventory visibility for planning
The purchasing application transformed the process from weeks to hours—a dramatic improvement that freed up valuable team capacity and enabled more strategic inventory management.
Warehouse Location Management and Picking Processes
Fulfil's warehouse management capabilities brought systematic organization to HairBow Center's fulfillment operations:
- Product location management ensuring everything had a designated place
- Optimized picking workflows guiding workers efficiently
- Mobile picking tools eliminating paper-based processes
- New employee training simplified by systematic processes
- 45 minutes of daily labor saved through workflow optimization
"Fulfil's automation saved us 45 minutes of labor per day in the warehouse and enabled us to quickly pivot to face mask production during COVID-19."
— Trent Banwart, CEO, HairBow Center
The warehouse improvements meant faster, more accurate fulfillment with less training time required.
Integrated Shipping Systems
Fulfil's native carrier integrations streamlined HairBow Center's shipping operations:
- Automated carrier label generation
- Rate shopping to optimize shipping costs
- Tracking number capture and customer notification
- Integrated packing workflows
- Support for multiple carrier options
The shipping automation reduced manual work and improved customer communication.
Multi-Channel Integration
Fulfil's native integrations with all of HairBow Center's sales channels eliminated manual coordination:
- Amazon Integration: Seamless order management and inventory sync for their largest channel
- eBay Integration: Automated order processing for their original marketplace
- Shopify Integration: Native connection for their DTC store
- Additional Marketplace Support: Foundation for expanding to Walmart and other channels
Orders flowed automatically from all channels into Fulfil, inventory synchronized in real-time, and the team could manage omnichannel operations from one unified platform.
Scalable Technology Architecture
Unlike the failed previous implementation, Fulfil provided a technology foundation that could scale with HairBow Center's growth:
- Cloud-based infrastructure eliminating local hardware requirements
- Performance capable of handling 5,000+ SKUs and growing transaction volumes
- Flexible data model accommodating evolving business needs
- Regular updates and improvements without disruption
- API capabilities enabling future integrations
The scalable architecture meant HairBow Center wouldn't outgrow the system as they continued expanding.
Consolidated Technology Stack
Fulfil consolidated the fragmented tools HairBow Center had been using:
- Inventory management replacing spreadsheets
- Order management across all channels
- Warehouse management with location tracking
- Purchase order management and receiving
- Shipping and carrier integration
- Reporting and analytics
The consolidation reduced technology complexity, eliminated reconciliation between systems, and provided unified data for decision-making.
Results: 7+ Years of Sustained Growth and Operational Excellence
The partnership between HairBow Center and Fulfil has delivered remarkable results over more than seven years—a testament to both the platform's capabilities and HairBow Center's strategic use of the tools provided.
300% Amazon Channel Growth
Perhaps the most impressive metric: HairBow Center achieved 300% growth in their Amazon channel sales. This explosive growth was enabled by:
- Accurate inventory management preventing overselling
- Efficient fulfillment meeting Amazon's performance requirements
- Ability to expand catalog without operational chaos
- Better purchasing ensuring stock availability
- Scalable operations handling increased volumes
The Amazon growth drove significant revenue increase and demonstrated HairBow Center's competitive strength in their largest marketplace.
Purchasing Time Reduced from Weeks to Hours
The transformation of the purchasing process delivered enormous time savings and strategic benefits:
- Tasks that consumed days or weeks now completed in hours
- Freed up team capacity for strategic initiatives
- More responsive purchasing capturing supplier deals
- Better inventory planning preventing stockouts
- Reduced excess inventory through smarter ordering
The purchasing efficiency wasn't just about time savings—it fundamentally improved inventory management and working capital efficiency.
57% SKU Growth Without Operational Chaos
From 2019 to 2022, HairBow Center increased their SKU count by 57%—expanding from an already large 5,000+ SKU catalog. The SKU growth was manageable because Fulfil's systems scaled seamlessly:
- Added complexity absorbed by automation
- Purchasing efficiency enabling management of more SKUs
- Warehouse location management accommodating expanded inventory
- Inventory tracking accurate despite increased complexity
The SKU expansion enabled HairBow Center to better serve customer needs and capture more market opportunities.
Maintained Sustainable Headcount
Despite dramatic growth in sales (300% on Amazon alone), SKU count (57% increase), and channel complexity, HairBow Center maintained sustainable operational headcount. The automation and efficiency enabled the same team to handle significantly more:
- Purchasing efficiency reducing administrative burden
- Warehouse automation improving fulfillment productivity
- Integrated channel management eliminating manual coordination
- Better tools enabling individual productivity
The headcount efficiency meant growth translated directly to improved profitability.
45 Minutes Daily Labor Saved in Warehouse
The warehouse location management and picking optimization saved 45 minutes of labor per day—approximately 180 hours annually. The savings came from:
- Optimized pick paths reducing walking time
- Location management eliminating product searches
- Mobile tools eliminating paper processes
- Better workflows reducing errors and rework
The labor savings reduced costs while improving fulfillment speed and accuracy.
Rapid Pivot to Face Mask Production During COVID-19
When COVID-19 created urgent demand for face mask supplies, HairBow Center's operational flexibility enabled a rapid pivot:
- Quickly sourcing and purchasing face mask materials
- Managing new product lines alongside existing catalog
- Scaling operations to meet demand surge
- Coordinating fulfillment of both craft supplies and masks
"Fulfil's automation saved us 45 minutes of labor per day in the warehouse and enabled us to quickly pivot to face mask production during COVID-19."
— Trent Banwart, CEO, HairBow Center
The agility to respond to unexpected market opportunities showcased the strategic value of operational flexibility.
Eliminated Daily Spreadsheet Crashes
The move from spreadsheets to Fulfil eliminated the daily crashes that had consumed team time and created data risk. The team gained:
- Reliable access to inventory data
- Confidence in data accuracy
- No more time lost to file recovery
- Reduced operational stress
- Better decision-making with current data
The elimination of spreadsheet chaos had intangible but significant quality-of-life benefits for the team.
7+ Year Partnership Demonstrating Long-Term Value
Perhaps the most telling result: HairBow Center has been successfully operating on Fulfil for over 7 years—a testament to the platform's sustained value:
- Continued return on investment year after year
- System scaling with business growth
- Ongoing improvements and capabilities added
- No need to re-platform as business evolved
- Strategic partnership rather than vendor relationship
The long-term partnership demonstrated that Fulfil delivered on its promises and continued providing value as HairBow Center's needs evolved.
Foundation for Continued Multi-Channel Expansion
With operations running smoothly on Fulfil, HairBow Center is now exploring expansion to additional marketplaces like Walmart. The platform provides the foundation to add channels confidently:
- Proven ability to scale with growth
- Multi-channel capabilities ready for new platforms
- Operational efficiency enabling channel expansion
- Strategic rather than reactive approach to growth
The expansion readiness means HairBow Center can pursue opportunities without operational constraints.
Data-Driven Decision Making
The comprehensive analytics and reporting capabilities enabled HairBow Center to make informed decisions about:
- Which products to expand or discontinue
- How to optimize inventory investment
- Which channels to prioritize
- Where to focus purchasing efforts
- How to allocate warehouse space
Data-driven decisions reduced risk and improved strategic outcomes.
Improved Customer Experience
The operational improvements translated directly to better customer experiences:
- Faster order fulfillment through warehouse optimization
- More accurate inventory availability preventing backorders
- Better tracking and communication
- Consistent fulfillment across all channels
Happy customers drove repeat purchases and positive reviews—critical for marketplace success.
Strategic Operational Posture
Most importantly, the operational improvements freed leadership capacity for strategic initiatives rather than firefighting:
- Exploring new product categories
- Evaluating new marketplace opportunities
- Optimizing supplier relationships
- Planning for continued growth
- Developing team capabilities
The shift from reactive to strategic operations enabled sustained competitive advantage.
The partnership between HairBow Center and Fulfil demonstrates how the right ERP platform enables sustainable long-term growth for craft supply and product businesses managing thousands of SKUs across multiple marketplaces. By eliminating spreadsheet chaos, reducing purchasing time from weeks to hours, optimizing warehouse operations, and enabling 300% Amazon growth, Fulfil provided the operational foundation for HairBow Center to thrive for 7+ years and counting—proving that successful technology partnerships deliver value year after year, not just during implementation.