Expanding Your Food Business Online | Challenges & Tips

The online world in the food industry is evolving. Online grocery shopping is even expected to be the fastest growing product category online. Which makes sense, knowing customer demands nowadays. Consumer tastes are shifting, there is more desire for convenience and cost-effectiveness. A shift towards online could help food companies to better focus on what the end-users want. But what are the challenges that food companies face when wanting to start investing in online?

Different end consumer with high demands

To start off, expanding your business online means you’ll get in touch with a different end consumer with high demands. Getting to know this customer and their wants and needs is of great importance before starting your journey into the online world.

A change in logistics

Shipping your product in smaller batches to more places, will lead to different logistics. This process needs to be well organized. A possible solution for this is working together with third party logistics. Our ERP platform Foodware 365 offers a link with DHL, making sending packages a smooth and automated process, without any hassle.

Keeping on top of rules and regulations

No news here, but as a food company, you have to adhere to strict rules and regulations in order to ensure food safety and quality. Mostly, online maintains the same rules and regulations as offline. Key here is keeping on top of these rules and regulations both offline and online, like changes in product, ingredient lists and nutritional values. The growing popularity of online comes with authorities carrying out more control programs and intervening where necessary, so keeping on top of rules and regulations is key.

Last but not least: Setting up a webshop

When wanting to expand your business online, you’ll obviously need a webshop where consumers can order easily. No worries here, Foodware 365 together with our partner specialized in webshops offers an excellent e-commerce solution for companies in the food sector, with a seamless connection between Foodware 365 and the webshop.

Do you want to expand your food business online, but don’t know where to start? Don’t hesitate to get in touch, we’ll gladly help you on your way.