The story behind the stack

Right after I put Tech Stack PRO out, I cloned it and started Tech Stack PRO 2.0.

What is the #1 thing I could add to it?

I believe it is context.

Where will the context behind a tech stack design be most helpful?

It will be for Founders and Operators battling the edge cases and quirks that most ecommerce businesses have tried to avoid.

I remember speaking to the Founder of VictorianPlumbing.co.uk. He was the UK's first eBay millionaire selling CDs, and he sold them because they were easy to post and handle.

The problem with easy is it is easy for everyone so he built a bathrooms business and has outlasted many better funded PE backed competitors over the last 10 years.

Similarly, Founders and Operators who build in new industries and create innovative consumer hardware.

Brands that take some manufacturing or assembly into their operations require skilled technicians to build and works order picking.

When you start looking into manufacturing workflows your options reduce big time, but it is amazing what you can buy off the shelf now.

Manufacturing workflows and mobile BOM picking were real differentiators for NetSuite and other bigger ERPs 5 years ago. Not so now.

Katana Manufacturing ERP offers robust manufacturing workflows (naturally) but is missing the mobile app picking you need to manage components picking flow and assembly. (happy to be told otherwise on this as things change)

This is a use case where DEAR Systems - Becoming Cin7 Core shines. Their warehouse app for running an ecommerce warehouse was useless when I last checked, and we replaced it a lot in Australia and NZ, where Dear Systems initially gained traction.

But apply the same mobile app platform to BOM picking, and you've got an ERP beater. For a fraction of the cost of NetSuite with Netsuite WMS, you're operating a mobile warehouse for components and finished goods.

DEAR Systems - Becoming Cin7 Core has connectors to Starshipit and other shipping APIs.

It is remarkable how fast the systems have evolved in the past five years, let alone the last ten.