Business management software and ERP for Safi businesses

Safi: ceramics, the sea and industry

Safi is one of Morocco's great pottery towns: on the potters' hill, generations of craftsmen shape, glaze and fire plates, tagines, vases and tiles sold across the country and abroad. The city is also a historic sardine port, with canneries, freezing units and seafood processing plants. Its multi-purpose port and its phosphate-processing chemical complex support a wide network of subcontractors in maintenance, logistics, transport and quality control.

Potters and canners have one thing in common: both turn a raw material into a finished product, with losses to control and purchases to anticipate. That is where an ERP makes the difference compared with a notebook or a spreadsheet.

Pottery and ceramics: bills of materials and kiln breakage

On the Pro and Group plans, SOGESTIO handles production. Each model has its bill of materials: clay, glaze and fittings, with quantities and a loss rate that includes breakage in the kiln. The production order consumes the components from stock and books the finished pieces at the real cost of the materials consumed.

Example for a run of 200 plates, using 2.5 kg of clay at 1.20 DH per kilo and 0.2 kg of glaze at 25 DH per kilo per plate, with 8% loss: clay 200 × 2.5 × 1.08 = 540 kg, or 648 DH; glaze 200 × 0.2 × 1.08 = 43.2 kg, or 1,080 DH. Materials cost 1,728 DH, or 8.64 DH per plate. If actual breakage exceeds the plan, the gap shows immediately in the cost of the run.

• Bills of materials per model with components, quantities and losses.
• Production orders that are planned, in progress or completed.
• Raw material and finished goods stock valued at CMUP (weighted average cost).
• Stocktaking to align book stock with what is actually in the workshop.
• Gross margin by product and by customer in the reports.

Canneries: know what to buy before the season

A cannery that receives an export order needs cans, oil, labels and cartons at the right time. SOGESTIO's requirements planning shows what to make and what to buy from customer orders and minimum stock levels. The principle: orders to fill, plus minimum stock, minus available stock.

Example: an order for 120,000 cans, a minimum stock of 20,000 empty cans and 70,000 cans on hand give a purchasing need of 70,000 cans. Purchase orders follow, then goods receipts bring the packaging into stock at net purchase cost. Batches then link each shipment to its production run.

A ceramics catalogue sold in Morocco and abroad

A Safi workshop may offer hundreds of references: shapes, sizes, patterns and colours. Each variant is managed as a separate item, with its own stock and minimum alerts. Price lists separate the shop, resellers and importers, and quotes go out in French, Arabic or English.

PDF invoices and quotes carry the workshop's logo and colour, the amount in words, bank details, the balance due and a QR code with the ICE number, invoice number, date and amounts. For an export order with a 30% deposit on 40,000 DH, the deposit invoiced is 12,000 DH and the balance 28,000 DH; the VAT treatment of exports should be confirmed with your chartered accountant.

Industrial and port subcontractors: purchasing, payroll and accounting

SMEs working for the chemical complex or the port, in maintenance, boilermaking, transport or cargo handling, manage frequent purchases and large teams. Purchase requests go through an approval workflow based on amount, supplier invoices are matched with the order and the receipt, and payroll produces payslips with CNSS, AMO and IR along with the DAMANCOM preparation file.

Every transaction creates its entry on the CGNC chart of accounts, up to the balance sheet, CPC and ESG. Your chartered accountant works in the same database with a dedicated role, and the audit log records every change.

An online service, from the potters' hill to the port

SOGESTIO has no office in Safi: it is an online service usable anywhere in Morocco, in Arabic, French or English, and setup is remote, with items and customers imported from Excel. The craftsman checks stock from the Android app or the web app installed on iPhone, and offline mode lets them prepare quotes, draft invoices and payments without signal; everything syncs once the connection is back.

Businesses that want to keep their data on their premises can choose the On-premise edition, installed on their server and usable without Internet. The 14-day free trial needs no card; a workshop can start on the Starter plan at 199 DH/month excluding VAT, then move to the Pro plan at 449 DH/month for production.