This article was generated by AI. Labelled in accordance with Article 50 of the EU AI Act. Responsible for publication: Sophera Consulting.
Wholesalers send two kinds of quotes, and automating quote generation works best when you treat them separately. For a one-off customer request, an AI agent drafts the quote in under a minute, and someone in sales checks prices and margin before approving it. Recurring quotes with fixed prices and discounts stored in the CRM go out without any approval.
By AI agent we mean a program that reads the request, pulls what it needs from the ERP and the CRM, and assembles a draft quote. It does not invent prices. It takes them from the system where they already live. The example below walks through one request. It is made up for this article and does not describe a client.
Automating quote generation in wholesale, one request at a time
Say a plumbing and heating wholesaler gets an email on Tuesday morning from an installer. Attached is a list of 14 items for an apartment building. Nine lines carry a manufacturer part number, three only a description such as "radiator valve DN 15, angled". One line reads "thermostat heads, same as last time, 24 pcs". The email asks for delivery to the building site by Friday.
Today, someone in inside sales opens the email, looks up every item in the ERP, checks stock and the customer's price, digs out the previous order for the thermostat heads and types the quote. One request is manageable. Thirty a day means inside sales spends more time searching than talking to customers, while the installer waits for numbers.
What does the agent do with the request?
First it decides whether the email is a request for a quote or already an order. Both land in the same sales inbox, along with complaints and delivery notices. Reading a request as an order would be the expensive mistake, so anything unclear goes onto a separate list for a person.
Next it matches the sender to a customer account. That settles which terms apply. In wholesale those are usually customer-specific prices and framework agreements with volume tiers and special conditions. The agent reads them from the ERP and keeps no price list of its own.
How does it find the right items?
The nine lines with part numbers are quick, since the number points straight to the item. For the three descriptions, the agent searches the catalogue and proposes the most likely match. If two items fit equally well, say the same valve from two manufacturers, it picks the one this customer bought last time and flags the line. "Same as last time" sends it to the customer's recent orders, where it finds the model.
Where do price and delivery date come from?
The price per line comes from the ERP, with the customer's terms applied. Then the agent checks available stock, meaning what is actually free after reservations for other orders. In our example two items are short. The agent enters the replenishment date from the system and notes in the cover text that those two will not make Friday.
What does sales see?
Within a minute the responsible salesperson has a draft: 14 lines with prices, delivery dates and a short cover note. Three lines are flagged, the two short items and the one with a second possible manufacturer. Any line whose margin falls below the threshold the wholesaler has set is flagged as well.
The salesperson checks prices and margin, maybe swaps one valve for an in-stock model from another brand, and approves. Only then does the quote go out through the configured channel, as an email with a PDF or into the customer portal. We always include this human approval step for one-off quotes, because prices and commitments to customers need a person who answers for them.
Which quotes can go out without approval?
Recurring quotes with fixed prices and discounts stored in the CRM can go out on their own. Picture a quarterly quote for consumables to a regular customer who gets the same items at agreed prices every time. The prices are settled, so sales has nothing left to check.
This follows autonomy levels. Up to level 3, a person makes the call on important steps while the system prepares the work. The one-off quote above sits there. From level 4 the system decides for itself, and at level 5 the recurring quote runs fully automatically. We agree with you before building which process runs at which level. A quote flow can move up a level later, once it is clear that sales hardly changes the drafts anymore.
What does the wholesaler need to provide?
Access to the ERP for items, prices and stock, access to the inbox where requests arrive, and the rules that today live in the heads of your sales team: when someone should look at the margin, which brand wins when two items are equivalent. Add 20 to 30 old requests together with the quotes that came out of them. We test the agent against those before it sees a live request. Exactly which access we need is something we sort out together in the Automation Check.
How long does it take, and what does it cost?
An agent like this is built in one to two days, and testing with real requests happens the same week. Our article on implementation time explains why larger projects are split into stages that each take days.
Sophera Consulting builds the quoting agent at a fixed price with no subscription. We map your quoting process during selection, build the agent on top of your ERP and CRM, and decide with you which quotes need approval. After that you only pay usage costs for the AI models, billed directly to you. A maintenance agent, included in the fixed price, watches the interfaces and reports changes. Which of your quote flows makes sense as a starting point is what the free Automation Check is for.
Where should a wholesaler start?
Start with the one-off quotes. A recurring quote is quickly copied from the last one. A one-off request ties up inside sales with item search, stock and pricing every single time, and that is where the customer is waiting. Once approval in sales has become routine, move the fixed quotes to level 5.
This article was created with the help of AI.
