The quality of many commodities impacts profitability, reputation, and compliance. Yet many companies still manage samples, lab results, and processing records separately from trade data. Are you spending too much time capturing and using quality data?
Working with a CTRM system that supports all of the various quality aspects of your commodity is essential for your success,. In coffee for instance, the different types and blends all have their unique specifications and qualities. And all the steps along the supply chain, logistics especially, are subject to rigorous quality controls. Without integrated tracking, proving origin, quality, or yield becomes difficult – if not impossible.
Executive Summary: why use the Agiblocks Sampling Add-on?
Agiboo’s Sampling add-on is designed to improve operational efficiency and transform how you manage quality, compliance, especially in sectors with numerous attributes like coffee.
Key reasons to adopt:
- Integrated quality management:
The add-on enables seamless tracking of samples, lab results, and processing records, linking them directly to inventory lots and contracts. This integration eliminates the inefficiencies and risks of managing disparate data, ensuring that quality, origin, and yield can be proven at every step of the supply chain.
- Automated pricing and compliance:
Sampling data is used to automatically calculate price adjustments (such as discounts) based on quality changes. This automation not only optimizes pricing but also supports compliance and audit requirements, reducing manual errors and saving time.
- Enhanced Risk Management and customer satisfaction:
By centralizing sampling processes, the add-on improves risk management, reduces costs, and boosts customer satisfaction through more reliable quality assurance and faster response times.
- Intuitive and scalable solution:
Initially developed for coffee – one of the most complex commodities – the module is intuitive for end-users and scalable to other commodities. This means businesses can easily extend best practices in sampling and quality control across their entire portfolio.
- Strategic supply chain visibility:
The add-on provides end-to-end visibility, from sample bag to final invoice, empowering executives to make informed decisions and maintain a competitive edge.
Sampling
Sampling is an important part of the commodity trade process, and indeed vital to understand and manage the quality of your particular commodity.
In coffee, a sample is taken for purposes of testing, quality analysis, archiving, marketing or other legal purposes. As such, accurate testing of samples and recording of the results all along the value chain is a necessity.
Dealing with sampling can be quite complex, but it is an essential part of the trade, in terms of testing, quality analysis, archiving, marketing or other legal purpose, and even pricing – as test results of samples are used to calculate discounts . That is, if a sample differs in quality from what was agreed in the contract, a discount would apply (especially when you are buying from famers, a discount schedule is pre-agreed or even pre-defined by the buyer). If all the data is entered correctly, our CTRM can calculate and handle the price changes and the implications for a given shipment automatically, which is a huge gain in efficiency and optimization. Agiblocks’ Samples module tracks sample collection, lab results, and links them to specific deliveries (or shipments) and inventory lots. Our commodity sampling add-on module significantly enhances the quality control, efficiency, and overall management of commodities, leading to better risk management, cost savings, and improved customer satisfaction.
Developing the sampling add-on
“When we started developing the sampling module [add-on], we focused on coffee specifically”, says Victor Favaro, senior CTRM consultant – “because it is by far the most complex. So for us, it was the obvious one to begin with. Testing the quality of coffee is the most difficult, as if offers the most complexities. But for the end-user, all that complexity is gone now: the sampling module is very intuitive and easy.”
“Now that we’ve covered all that it takes to deal with the sampling complexities of coffee, we can apply it to all other commodities as well.”
“All the variables are already there in Agiblocks. And if they aren’t, it is 100 percent configurable so that you can add whatever you need. From aroma, body and flavour to uniformity, acidity and remnant flavour, it’s all there. References, bags, quantities, properties. Moreover, now that we’ve covered all that it takes to deal with all the aspect of sampling for coffee, we can apply it to all other commodities is well. All the necessary properties come standard in Agiblocks, so you can just pick and mix. The module works well on its own, so we can install the feature as is.”
“Another important factor is the fact that we can map all the samples and send the documents to the supplier, with reporting on the status along all of the steps. And that part is customizable too: let’s say you want a sample without contract (eg. not mandatory), you can create that easily, and attach the real contract / delivery at a later stage. If you have a sample, you can create whatever test you want. Once we link a sample to a delivery, we also attach the full data of that sample as hidden data to the contract, so everything is there – readily available. In grains for example you have to change the quantity due to shrinkage because of moisture, so it is easy to change the contract there as well and have a new price based on that rate too. By tackling the complexities of coffee sampling we have all the opportunities for grain covered too – but also cocoa, sugar, cotton, biofuels, you name it.”
By allowing and maintaining intuitive recording of sampling data from pre-shipment levels and subject to sample conditions, quality assurance is ensured – and the same goes for all the financial, logistics and/or risk management implications down the line. The developed sampling module that is virtually unrivalled in the world of CTRM solutions significantly enhances the quality control, efficiency, and overall management of commodities, leading to better risk management, cost savings, and improved customer satisfaction.
In summary
Agiboo’s Sampling add-on is a strategic investment for any commodity business seeking to modernize quality management, automate compliance, and drive operational excellence. Its proven effectiveness in coffee sets a strong foundation for broader adoption across other commodities, delivering measurable gains in efficiency, risk mitigation, and customer trust.
