BlueCart is a B2B e-Commerce platform for wholesale food distributors and buyers. As of 2019, over 80,000 businesses have placed over 1 million orders through the platform.
Located in Downtown Valparaiso, FLUID Coffeebar was founded in 2015, as a third-wave coffee roastery and cafe that specializes in traditional espresso, pour overs, coffee cocktails, and other concoctions.
In addition to providing daily doses of amazing caffeine to the neighborhood, FLUID Coffeebar’s owners, Chuck and Alison Scates, love promoting arts and community events. They occasionally have open-mic nights, artists' gatherings, book signings, art pop-ups, independent writers group, tarot card nights, and more.
The couple also wants to support local businesses and uplift others. Chuck shares that the team has been working with other businesses across Northwest Indiana to provide quality ingredients and baked goods to their customers.
“We are proud to be working globally and locally using direct trade practices. We also love promoting the arts,” he states.
How the FLUID Coffee team uses BlueCart to eliminate the manual ordering process.
Prior to using BlueCart for all their ordering needs, FLUID Coffeebar was placing their orders and processing their invoices manually using pen and paper.
Since adopting BlueCart, they’ve eliminated these manual processes. With just a few taps, Chuck can easily create purchase orders on his mobile phone using the BlueCart mobile app for Buyers. When he submits his orders, an email is sent to his suppliers so the order can immediately be confirmed and fulfilled.
BlueCart has also helped Chuck connect with other roasters, such as Tinker Coffee, Dark Matter, and Intelligentsia, enabling him to expand his offering to his clientele and grow his business.
“With Tinker Coffee, for instance, I can place an order within 5 minutes! They keep their offerings up to date [on BlueCart] so I do not have to manually enter anything. That saves me a bunch of time!” Chuck talks about his experience of using BlueCart to order to their suppliers.
Additionally, he also enjoys BlueCart’s ability to add all suppliers and manage all orders on a single platform, even when the supplier is not using BlueCart.
“Prior to ordering from Tinker, I ordered from Dark Matter Coffee. They did not have an online ordering system so I manually added them to BlueCart. That sped up the process.” Chuck continued, “[...] BlueCart is more streamlined and is an app instead of [a] website. Overall, I would say BlueCart saves me 30 minutes to 1 hour per week.“
As they start to expand their business as a multi-roaster cafe, they plan to use BlueCart to help with their coming orders and further grow their business.