Industries · Food & Beverage

Cut shorts without over-ordering

Whitespace helps broadline and specialty foodservice distributors decide reorder quantities and run purchasing with AI, sized to the case pack and the next truck.

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Whitespace agent

I've reviewed tomorrow's chilled PO. 12 lines can wait for Thursday's truck without running short. Shall I hold them?

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The problem

What foodservice distributors tell us about replenishment.

Overstock goes in the bin

Over-buy a short-life line and it goes out of date. That stock gets thrown away or donated, and the loss comes straight off the budget.

Shorts every day across thousands of SKUs

Buyers usually find out a line has run out when it's already gone. The lines everyone assumes never run out are the ones nobody checks.

Big orders and promos that distort the history

One large customer order or a promo week makes a line look busier than it is, and the next PO over-buys.

Weather and seasons that move demand

A warm winter or a late season shifts demand more than any average shows, and a system that repeats history will suggest seasonal lines out of season.

The solution

No more manual line-by-line ordering.

Every line reviewed and explained. Agents work out what each product needs and draft the order. Your buyers check it, sign off line by line and export the PO.

ReorderERP · updated 05:40 Export

Cover by product

SKU

Product

Stock

Sales/wk

Cover

AI order

ROM-24

Romaine hearts, 24 ct

0.4 wk

120

BUN-BRI-48

Brioche burger buns, 48 ct

120

150

0.8 wk

260

top buyers · last 4 wks

customer	Aug 3	Aug 10	Aug 17	Aug 24
The Anchor Kitchen	74		96	58
Lakeside Deli	41	66		47
Harbor Grill	28		52
Calder Cafe		35	21	30
Northside Pizza	15			22

MOZ-5LB

Mozzarella loaf, 5 lb

0.7 wk

160

NAP-13-2P

Napkins, 2-ply case

640

552

1.2 wk

2,200

Every number explains itself, fully traceable and auditable.

Demand to the next truck+380

Free stock + on order−120

AI order, rounded to pack260

80%

time saved on reordering

Fewer shorts on the lines operators order every week.

Less waste from short-life stock that would go out of date.

01 · Overstock goes in the bin

Orders sized to the next truck

Each PO covers demand until the following delivery, rounded to the case pack, so short-life lines aren't bought weeks ahead.

02 · Shorts every day across thousands of SKUs

Every SKU checked, not just the busy ones

Cover is checked against lead time on every line, so low stock shows up before operators get shorts.

03 · Big orders and promos that distort the history

Questions before an unusual order is repeated

When a customer suddenly doubles an order, the AI asks your buyer whether it is a one-off before the next PO.

04 · Weather and seasons that move demand

Your buyers make the seasonal calls

Sales rates blend 30, 90 and 270 days so one odd week does not swing the order, and buyers adjust any line before sign-off.

Beyond inventory planning

Run more of your business on Whitespace

Inventory planning is one product on the Whitespace platform. The same platform runs order processing, customer service and data analysis, plus custom agents for jobs specific to your business.

Agents

Agents built for the jobs distributors do every day.

Inventory Planning
Order Processing
Customer Service
Data Analysis
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Context & knowledge

A living brain of your business that powers every agent.

Integrations

Reads from and writes back to your ERP, Outlook, accounting software and WMS.

Specialization for distribution

An agentic harness that makes general-purpose models reliable for distribution workflows.

Large language models

Model-agnostic. Each task runs on the best, most cost-effective model.

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