The Commercial Case for Adding Fashion to Your Business Central Practice
Usually, when you win a new Business Central deal, the ERP implementation brings consultancy work, licences, and a new logo for the customer list. You’re pleased. The project begins and revenue starts flowing in. But what if there was more commercial opportunity beyond that?
Many fashion companies use Business Central to handle their core operations, yet still need additional solutions to support the industry-specific processes the ERP does not cover by itself. This is where the wider commercial opportunity comes into play.
By adding a fashion ISV solution to your offering, not only will you enhance the total value for your customers (and increase their stickiness), but you could also benefit from additional recurring subscription margin, more licence sales, and further services throughout the lifecycle.
Moving beyond the initial implementation
Most Business Central partners face similar commercial pressures in that customers compare similar-looking ERP propositions. Day rates come under scrutiny, and the conversation can quickly shift towards delivery cost because buyers struggle to see meaningful differences between the offerings.
Fashion in particular is susceptible to these conversations because its operational requirements are difficult to cover through standard ERP functionality alone. Products exist across seasons, ranges, colours, sizes, and other variants. Companies may also manage sourcing, wholesale, and multichannel distribution processes that require deeper capability.
Partners entering those conversations with an ISV solution like K3 Pebblestone do so with proven fashion functionality built on Business Central. They can speak to the buyer’s actual operation without having to custom-build every missing process.
A recurring stake in the customer’s growth
It’s all well and good to say “earn more margin”, but you may be sat there wondering what exactly that looks like. For K3 Pebblestone partners, that includes a 30% recurring margin on subscriptions.
The percentage is, of course, an indication and the precise commercial terms would be confirmed as part of the partnership agreement. Crucially, though, the revenue does not require partners to become software vendors – we own the full product lifecycle.
This includes the development, maintenance, compliance, and roadmap for K3 Pebblestone, while the partner sells, implements, and supports the solution.
The best part is that the value of the relationship can grow in tandem with the customer. As the customer adds more users, entities, or operational requirements, subscription revenue may grow alongside the possibility of further consulting and support work.
One fashion deal can open several Microsoft conversations
Going back to the stickiness point, a BC implementation with K3 Pebblestone can also create demand for additional Microsoft products since the customer is heavily invested in the ecosystem.
Deeper BC usage, for example, may result in additional licences, while reporting and automation requirements could create opportunities for upselling Power BI and Power Platform. Integrations, data requirements, and collaboration might also bring Azure and Microsoft 365 into the wider customer conversation.
The point is not so much to attach every Microsoft product to every deal, but more to recognise that an ERP that sits closer to the centre of a fashion company’s operation has more potential to connect with the other technologies in the ecosystem.
More importantly, those opportunities will continue after go-live. Fashion customers may need to integrate point-of-sale, eCommerce, warehouse management, or EDI systems, and then optimise those connections as channels and processes change.
Finally, release adoption, managed services, and ongoing enhancements can all create further revenue throughout the customer lifecycle.
Growing without building your own fashion product
You could well think that an alternative route into fashion is to build the specialist functionality internally. While that would give you ownership of the IP, it also brings the cost and responsibility that come with said ownership.
The overheads are not confined to development either. You would also need to maintain the product as new versions of BC are released, patch gaps discovered during implementation, and manage a roadmap that keeps the solution valuable over the long term.
Bespoke work could also make future projects harder to repeat because each customer gradually ends up with its own variation of the product.
K3 Pebblestone mitigates those issues since the functionality exists and we own the R&D around it – meaning your delivery teams don’t have to worry about bespoke development and can instead benefit from a repeatable implementation model.
We also provide product and sales training, co-marketing support, pipeline assistance, delivery frameworks, demos, and dedicated partner resources to help you grow your practice.
Make more from Business Central
Fashion offers several routes to additional value in the customer relationship. Your initial project might carry significant scope and revenue promise, but the simple act of partnering with K3 means you could generate more recurring margin, drive more Microsoft licence sales, and benefit from further services work.
If you’d like to learn more about partnering with K3 Fashion Solutions, we’d be happy to talk you through what the next steps are.