Cannon Europe, Cannon Tools, & Neilson Tools Streamline Multi-brand Operations with Odoo ERP

Cannon Europe, Cannon Tools, and Neilsen Tools are three different companies with different trading entities that source products from manufacturing partners in China and India and distribute them across the United Kingdom and continental Europe.

All physical stock management and distribution are centralized at their primary headquarters located at Rowley Regis, West Midlands. However, they create continuous purchases and sales internally based on their orders.

Situation Before the Project

Before Master Software Solutions was engaged, the group operated in a fragmented technology environment. Cannon Europe had an existing Odoo instance to manage its own operations, but the other two brands, Cannon Tools and Neilsen Tools, were running entirely on manual.

Business Challenges

Before implementing Odoo, Cannon Tools faced a series of compounding operational challenges that were hampering growth and customer satisfaction. As the business expanded its product range and distribution footprint, the limitations of disconnected systems became increasingly costly.

Fragmented Operations Across Three Companies

With Cannon Europe BVBA on Odoo and the other two brands running on spreadsheets and manual records, there was no unified view of the group’s operations. Stock data, order information, and financial records were siloed across three separate working environments with no automated connectivity between them.

• No consolidated view of group-wide stock, orders, or financials
• Data had to be manually reconciled between the parent and child entities
• Reporting across the group required significant manual effort

Warehouse & Inventory Management

For Cannon Tools and Neilsen Tools, managing warehouse operations manually results in frequent, inaccurate inventory records. Without a system tracking goods in and out in real time, the business could not reliably know what stock was available to sell.

• Inventory levels were unreliable; no real-time visibility across locations
• Stock discrepancies led to overselling and customer dissatisfaction
• Manual stock counts were time-consuming and still produced errors

Order Fulfilment Failures

The absence of an order management system for the child brands meant that orders were frequently missed, delayed, or incorrectly fulfilled. Without automated workflows to route, prioritise, and track orders through to dispatch, the warehouse team had no reliable system to work from.

• Orders are missed or fulfilled incorrectly due to a lack of centralised tracking.
• No automated routing of orders to the appropriate warehouse location
• Customer service lacked real-time visibility into order status
• Returns and back orders are handled inconsistently

Intercompany Transactions Not Automated

Cannon Europe BVBA regularly sold goods to both Cannon Tools and Neilsen Tools as intercompany transactions. These transactions were handled manually in the absence of a multi-company Odoo setup linking all three entities, resulting in duplicate entries, complicated reconciliation, and a chance of inconsistencies between company accounts.

• Intercompany sales and purchases are processed through manual documentation.
• No automatic generation of corresponding purchase orders on receipt of an intercompany sale
• Reconciliation between company accounts was slow and error-prone

Shopify Integration Gaps

Both Cannon Tools and Neilsen Tools operate Shopify storefronts for B2C sales. With no integration between these storefronts and any back-end system, online orders had to be manually transferred to the warehouse team, leading to delays, data errors, and stock level discrepancies on the website.

• Online orders are not automatically included in the warehouse operations
• Website stock levels did not reflect actual warehouse availability
• Manual re-entry of Shopify orders caused delays and introduced errors
• Customer dispatch notifications were not sent automatically

Custom Commercial Invoice Requirements

As an importer sourcing goods from China and India, the group required accurate commercial invoices for every inbound shipment to satisfy UK and EU customs requirements. These were being produced manually, creating compliance risk and consuming significant administrative time.

• Commercial invoices are created manually per shipment from templates
• Risk of errors in declared values, HS codes, and country of origin fields
• No standardised, branded format consistent across all shipments

The Solution: Odoo Multi-Company Implementation

Master Software Solutions designed and delivered a multi-company Odoo implementation that connected all three entities, Cannon Europe BVBA, Cannon Tools, and Neilsen Tools, within a single Odoo environment. Rather than replacing the existing Cannon Europe BVBA Odoo instance, the project extended and restructured it to incorporate the two child brands, bringing the entire group onto one unified platform.

Multi-Company Setup

The foundation of the implementation includes establishing a proper, structured multi-company configuration within Odoo. Each of the three companies operates as an independent entity with its own chart of accounts, product catalog, customer and supplier records, and financial reporting, while all three share the same Odoo instance.
Users across the group can switch between companies seamlessly, and management can view brand-level or consolidated group reports from a single login. The existing Cannon Europe BVBA configuration was preserved and enhanced rather than replaced.

Intercompany Sales & Purchases

One of the most impactful elements of the project was automating the intercompany trading flows between Cannon Europe BVBA and its two child brands. Cannon Europe purchases from suppliers in China and India, then sells those products through to Cannon Tools and Neilsen Tools.

• When Cannon Europe BVBA raises a sale to a child brand, a corresponding purchase order is automatically created in that child company
• Intercompany invoices are generated and matched on both sides without manual intervention.
• Stock movements between companies are tracked and reconciled in real time
• Intercompany pricing rules are applied consistently across all transactions
• Full audit trail available for every intercompany transaction across all three entities

Warehouse & Inventory Management

Each company’s Odoo Inventory module was set up with multi-location warehouse management, providing real-time stock visibility throughout all its distribution centers.

• Multi-warehouse setup covering all storage locations for both Cannon and Neilsen
• Real-time stock levels are visible across all companies and all locations
• Automated reordering rules to prevent stockouts on high-velocity products
• Barcode scanning support for efficient goods receipt and dispatch
• Complete stock segregation between Cannon Tools and Neilsen Tools catalogues
• Demand forecasting tools to inform purchasing decisions from the China and India suppliers

Order Management

A structured, automated order management workflow replaced the manual processes that had caused missed and delayed fulfillments for Cannon Tools and Neilsen Tools.

• Sales orders are automatically routed to the correct warehouse based on stock availability.
• Picking, packing, and shipping workflows with real-time status tracking at every stage.
• Automated back-order creation when partial stock is available
• Customer order confirmations and dispatch notifications are sent automatically
• Full order history and end-to-end audit trail available to all relevant users

Shopify Integration (B2C)

A Shopify-Odoo connector was used to link the Cannon Tools and Neilsen Tools Shopify storefronts to Odoo, establishing a live, two-way connection between the operational back-end and the B2C sales channels.

Orders placed on either Shopify storefront are immediately visible in Odoo, automatically initiate the picking workflow at the relevant warehouse, and update the website’s stock availability, removing the need for manual re-entry and delays.

Custom Commercial Invoice

Master Software Solutions created a one-of-a-kind commercial invoice template in Odoo, generated directly from purchase orders from Cannon Europe BVBA, for the group’s import operations from China and India.

• Generated automatically from confirmed purchase orders, with no manual document preparation
• Includes all customs-required fields: HS commodity codes, country of origin, declared value
• Carries Cannon Europe or child brand identity as applicable to the shipment
• Fully consistent format meeting UK and EU customs documentation requirements
• Reduces administrative burden and eliminates the risk of errors in customs paperwork

Results & Business Impact

The multi-company Odoo implementation delivered a fundamental transformation in how the group operates. Master Software Solutions eliminated manual processes that were causing operational failures by connecting Cannon Europe, Cannon Tools, and Neilsen Tools into a single unified platform and replacing them with automated, dependable workflows.

Key Performance Indicators

• 98%+ Order Fulfillment
• 99% Inventory Accuracy
• 75% Less Manual Data Entry
• 3-to-1 System Consolidated
• 100% Shopify Order Synced
• Real-Time Stock Visibility
• 0 Min Invoice Prep Time
• Instant Intercompany PO Creation

About Master Software Solutions

Master Software Solutions is a specialist Odoo implementation partner with deep experience delivering ERP solutions for distribution, wholesale, and multi-brand businesses. We design and implement Odoo environments that unify operations, automate workflows, and provide businesses with the real-time visibility they need to scale confidently, from initial setup and custom development through to training, integration, and ongoing support.