Epicor CMS vs. Odoo

Through daily use of Epicor, it is apparent that at it's basest level, it favors a stock-based manufacturing model (your company has established SKUs and Production works to replenish stock levels when a KANBAN or other system triggers a re-order point). While it excels at that, ours is a custom-order industrial manufacturing model (we produce to customer specification or repeat orders), meaning there is no stocking of finished components, only the materials it takes to make them. It's taken some finesse (and the purchase of additional modules) to get to where we need to be.

Incentivized

It is well suited for inventory tracking, shipping and sales work flows. While some customization is needed to make it functional, if done correctly Odoo can serves as a powerful one stop shop for all of a businesses needs. The ease of customization for email templates, both for sales communications and marketing outreach leaves something to be desired. Perhaps our team hasn't explored this fully enough. I have personally found it intimidating in trying to construct a news letter using the email marketing module

Incentivized

• EDI Order Processing
• Serialized Inventory Tracking
• Order Processing

Incentivized

• The creation of products is extremely simple, I like that it does not complicate you to put a lot of detail, of course if you want to put more detailed information later it allows you to do it without problems
• The fact that I can manage my inventory of my warehouse is very convenient, I only generate my stock report of the products we have in stock and taking inventory is easier
• The management of opportunities in the CRM is also great, because the guys from the sales department generate their opportunity, place what their client is requiring and we, the logisticians, can automatically generate the quote for what they are requesting, and from there they can only download their quote and send it to their clients.

Incentivized

• Too "modular"
• Each task involves opening a new window.
• Slow to process orders (despite upgraded fiber-optic internet).
• More geared towards stock-based manufacturing rather than made-to-order, without requiring additional modules.

Incentivized

• Customer service is nonexistent. You will need a 3rd party to assist you.
• The system has an open app for integrating with other programs. These are developed by third parties and can be hit or miss in functionality.
• The system offers great flexibility; however, it is too much and requires coding. For example, changing a Sales order PDF requires coding to modify the document.
• Initial implementation is clunky and seems to require a 3rd party just for setup.

Incentivized

CMS takes time to learn and use the menu driven green screen. However, once you are familiar it makes for fast navigation.

Incentivized

Once you complete the training with Odoo, you have a great grasp of how the system works, and most every feature is intuitive- There is rarely a task within Odoo that I get frustrated trying to figure out- I can typically look through the system and find what I need to do, and if I ever do need support, the Odoo Support team is excellent

Incentivized

Support is getting better but can still be slow to respond.

Incentivized

Easy - there is NO SUPPORT (like in ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!!!!!!!). Even for legally mandatory requirements where the system MUST work, they will gladly take a month to get back to you with a NON-answer. We couldn't even get our bank statements correctly into Odoo for 2 months - leading to no reconciliation and the company accounts were a mess (still are!!) as a result - Completely irresponsible. Have not EVEN had an apology from Odoo - they couldn't care less !!

Epicor CMS had a UI that was deemed more aesthetically pleasing than (subjective, naturally!) Sage, for which we attended a presentation/orientation session. Our Team felt Epicor (once outfitted with the necessary add-ons) would be better suited in the long run for longevity and ongoing support (especially considering our outgoing software was Sage).

Incentivized

We decided to go with Odoo over Netsuite due to a few factors. Price was a big reason why, Netsuite is the most expensive ERP we vetted. I also did not have a great experience with Netsuite at my last job. I was on the roll out team and it did not work as promised for POS, inventory managing or reporting, it crashed constantly in the middle of using it. Just over all very poor. Considering it is owned by Oracle and the most expensive, you would think it would be able to function on some sort of base level. That company ended up terminating their contract with Netsuite early and going with a different company.

We don't have crashing or error issues. I can complete receives, cycle counts etc and all of my information saves. Visually, Odoo is more satisfying also.

Incentivized

• Epicor has necessitated dedicated "Staging" personnel, as multi-line orders are generated as individual orders to Production/Manufacturing, meaning someone must ensure they all come together upon completion prior to shipping.
• Payroll and Accounts Payable/Receivable have noted improved integration and tracking compared to the legacy/outgoing software (Business Vision).
• Inventory tracking is vastly improved over the outgoing software, with detailed reports/tracking of remnant/off-cut materials, which benefits Material Handlers as well as the Purchasing Manager for keeping the inventory budget in line with targets.

Incentivized

• In older versions, it was super expensive to make it even work. You had to hire third-party developers all the time.
• Newest versions have better built in functionality.
• Cost is pretty high. Odoo plus developers to support it could bankrupt a small business.

Incentivized