Kramp App

Imagine: the harvest season has started and you have to bring in your harvest quickly. But then your traktor breaks. What to do? Fortunately, there is Kramp, the European wholesaler for technical spare parts, which delivers within one day. But then you have to find the right product. And you don't have your laptop on the land. Together with Kramp, we developed a new iOS and Android app for farmers and dealers.

Kramp
Not many people know it, but Kramp is the largest European wholesaler of technical spare parts and accessories for the agricultural sector. The Amazon of technical parts, so to speak. The Dutch company delivers thousands of products per day to dealers and repair companies from agriculture, horticulture and forestry in 22 countries within a day. In addition to the extensive range and fast delivery, the success of Kramp is mainly due to the pursuit of continuous innovation. Their goal: to make the work of dealers and farmers as simple as possible. To solve the biggest barriers for dealers, we developed the Kramp App to quickly find the right product.

The problem
A range of 500,000 products. Find the product you need in it. Because which screw are you looking for exactly? Which pump is involved? Which product is suitable for your agricultural machine? Which of these bags and boxes must go to which farmer or end customer? And once the delivery has arrived: which products are in the box?

The solution
The Kramp App makes finding and recognizing the (correct) products a lot easier. With barcode scans you can find the contents of a crate. And you find which product it is. Via image recognition you get to see possible results within a few seconds. In addition, the entire range is available by browsing and searching.

Step 1: research and jumpstart
Prior to the development, Kramp and GRiDD conducted extensive research into users and their needs, which resulted in an elaborate plan. To properly assess the development of the new app, we started the project with a jumpstart: within a week we built a prototype to investigate the feasibility and share it with internal stakeholders.

Step 2: close collaboration with the Kramp Hub
For the construction of the iOS and Android app, we worked closely with the developers of the so-called Kramp Hub, an innovation lab that develops new technological solutions within the company. The Kramp developers made the back-end as well as the link with stock, customer and other systems. We then developed the React Native app for Android and iOS, which was delivered as an MVP for the Agritechncia trade fair in Hanover.

Object recognition and machine learning
A special feature of the new app is image recognition. Finding a product in the online catalog is not only possible by scanning a barcode but also by taking a photo of the relevant part. The underlying object recognition model was developed by the Kramp Hub in collaboration with Google. We made it very easy to use the feature in the app. The user gets appropriate results from object recognition and helps train the machine learning models, a unique feature in the wholesale sector. No less than 17,000 photos were uploaded in the first two months.

To get even more feedback into the system, we built a tool with which the Kramp specialists can assess whether the recommendations of the AI model are really correct. The specialists get to see the photo and the proposed products, so that they can adjust the model manually. In short: artificial intelligence used for a better app experience.

Step 3: continuous development
Kramp knows very well, however, that launching an app is not an end point. Testing was carried out during the development process, but feedback was also actively collected from customers and business specialists after the launch to make the app even better. For example, crate scanning was added. In this way we have made the ordering process even easier.

Step 4: taking the app in-house
When setting up this product, we took into account in our tech stack the desire of Kramp to take the application in-house. In 2020 we have transfered the app to the developers of Kramp.

SpinAward
In 2020, the Kramp App won a silver SpinAward, the prize for digital creativity in the Netherlands. The jury praised the simplicity and goal-oriented approach. The jury was also surprised by the daring and successful use of object recognition in the app.

Dutch Interactive Award
In the same year, the app also won a golden Dutch Interactive Award. The DIA are the prizes for the very best interactive online work by Dutch agencies and have been awarded annually since 2010. The Kramp App received the award in the B2B commerce category.

Lovie Award and International Customer Experience Award
As if all that wasn't enough, the Kramp App also won a silver Lovie Award in 2020, the most prestigious prize within the European internet community, in the category 'Apps, Mobile & Voice: Utilities & Services'. And at the International Customer Experience Awards, the application came first in the 'Best Use of Mobile' category.