Database Programming

Cloverfield Meats

The Beef Order Form

Suppose a farmer wants a cow or pig carcass cut up in a particular way. Cloverfield Meats wanted the ability to take these sort of customer orders and put them straight into the computer.

This order form (Figure 1) can record the farmers instructions in minute detail: e.g. the thickness of the steaks or how much sausage is required. Frequently, farmers might ask for a cow to be cut up as it was in a previous order. The new order form can be prepared from an old order form with one click of a mouse button.

Uninspected Meat

Cattle or pigs that haven't been killed in a slaughter house cannot be sold to the general public. To help prevent this from happening Uninspected meat labels (Figure 2) are placed on the packaged meat. At the click of a mouse button the program can print a sheet of labels from the completed order form.

Printing out the Beef Order Form

After the order has been taken on the computer, it can be printed out in a format for a butcher to use (Figure 3). Once the animal has been cut up, the butcher records information on this form about quantity and weight, in good old pen and ink!. This information is then fed into the computer and the costs calculated automatically. An invoice can then be prepared, at the click of a mouse button (Figure 4) using information entered in the Beef Order Form.

The Pork Order Form

The Pork Order Form (Figure 5) works in almost exactly the same way as the Beef Order Form. It is quick and easy to :

• base a new order on an old one
• print out the Pork Order Form in a different format for use by the butcher (Figure 6)
• create Uninspected meat labels at the click of a mouse button.
• calculate costs
• print out invoice from information provided in the order form.

Costs and Prices

Custom cutting of pork and beef carcasses is only part of Cloverfield's business. They also own a butcher's shop. They order complete carcasses from their supplier, cut it up, turn some into hamburger or sausage and then sell to the public. The price of meat varies from week to week and from supplier to supplier. It was difficult to know how to set prices with such fluctuation in costs. One determining factor to setting the price is to know what your costs are. To calculate costs, a form was developed (Figure 7) to record everything that the company either bought from their suppliers or sold to the general public.

Each entry is catagorized according to what it is ( a company product, an item from a supplier, etc.) Some items are catagorized as recipes because they require several items or ingredients to make up that product. For example, the finished product, Beef Roast boneless blade is a recipe made up of ingredients (the meat and all its packaging). Each recipe is recorded, with the quantities required to make that product (Figure 8). Knowing the cost of each ingredient and the quantities used to make that product, it is possible to calculate how much it costs to make that product. The cost of the product includes a mark up of a certain percentage for running costs, like gas and electricity.

The Description Form contains several hundred entries. You may only wish to view a subsection of those entries, such as items bought from a supplier. This can be done, simply by selecting the subsection you want.

Having filled in all the entries in the Description Form, a lot can be done with that information.

• Costs of products can be calculated, given the costs of items from the suppliers.
• Having calculated the cost of a given item, and decided on a mark-up, prices can be calculated automatically.
• A price list of all products, together with costs and mark ups can be made and printed out (Figure 9)
• A price list of all products can be made in a format that can be put on the Internet. (Figure 10)
• A complete printed report of the Descriptions Form can be made (Figure 11)
• A print-out of Suppliers' costs can be made (Figure 12)
• The information can be used to calculate General Orders (see below).

General Orders

Some wholesalers may telephone to make large orders from the shop. It is possible to put these orders straight onto the computer (Figure 13), calculate the prices including discounts and to print-out an invoice (Figure 14).

Customers

To enter information about Beef, Pork, or General Orders, essential details about the customer are taken (Figure 15). This only needs to happen once. It is easy to make a search to find the details of a particular customer (Figure 16). For example, you can search for a customer by entering their telephone number into the search field.

Letters to Customers

The program is capable of managing form letters to customers, such as notices of sales on various products or "we value your custom" letters. Figure 17 shows the form that does this task. It can output these letters in various formats:

• A format to put on the web (Figure 18)
• A format to send to selected customers using e-mail. The message and the email addresses are exported to a text document that can be pasted into the body of an e-mail. (Figure 19)
• A form letter to varous customers (Figure 20). Notice that each letter is personalised.

Summary

This database was developed with a lot of thought, planning and a thorough understanding of this meat cutting business. It does a lot to save the company time and effort. The program was built using Microsoft Access tied together with SQL and Visual Basic code.

This is just one example of how a custom made computer program can help a business run more efficiently. Perhaps there are aspects of your business that could run more efficiently if some custom made software was introduced. Get in touch for a free consultation.

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