Client: (Client name changed for privacy.)
Role: Operations and Systems Designer
Headquarters: Australia
Industry: Retail / E-commerce
Team Size: 11-50 employees
Year: 2023
Areas Impacted: Operations, Product Management, Marketing, Sales
The tools behind the product pipeline.
The operations lead at this business had already put in the effort to define a solid product launch process. They mapped out nine clear stages for running the business. But they still needed a system to bring everything together.
An Australian tile retailer with a small team of 6 to 10 people, serving different markets. As their product catalog grew to meet demand, they had to launch more products. This put extra strain on their process and it started to show problems.
To see what would need to be fixed, it helps to look at how a product launch worked back then.
The process began with Idea Generation: brainstorming new tile ideas, making mood boards, analyzing prices, choosing suppliers, and recording color references. All of this was tracked in a spreadsheet. When samples arrived, and the team reviewed them, the product moved to Design and Prototyping. This stage included feedback with suppliers, confirming costs, setting minimum order quantities, getting financing approved, and making packaging decisions. Notes from this part were kept in another spreadsheet.
Once samples were approved, someone needed to add the product to the system, create SKUs, assign GTIN codes, set prices, add tags and metafields, and set up shipping rules. Some of these tasks were done in DEAR Inventory, others in Shopify. After that, the product moved into different workflows at the same time.
One team member set up the product in Shopify and communicated with suppliers. Another managed purchase orders, deposits, and tracked production in DEAR. A third person handled final photography, wrote product descriptions, organized collections, and worked on search optimization. Finally, the launch involved confirming dates, preparing marketing materials, receiving stock, checking quality, setting up showroom displays, and contacting customers.
Because information was everywhere, no one knew exactly where each product was in the process. The operations lead had to ask people directly for updates. Team members often waited for an email or message that arrived late, so products would finish one stage and then sit idle because the next person didn’t know it was ready.
The first step wasn’t to start building a new system. Instead, I sat down with the operations lead to map out every stage, step, handoff, decision point, and the information that needed to move between people. We looked at the official process and how things worked, including where problems usually happened.
From those sessions, we realized the process itself was practical and the solution was not to change how they worked, but to build an infrastructure that could support their existing operation.
The answer was to set up an Airtable system with five main tables, each covering a major phase of the product journey. These were all linked to a central Products Table that tracked every item through all nine stages using status fields and filtered views. Now, anyone on the team could open Airtable and instantly see where each product was in the pipeline.
The Idea Generation table allowed team members to submit new product ideas, including descriptions, mood boards, price analysis, supplier choices, and color references. Once submitted, the idea showed up in a filtered view for the operations team to review and approve. The Design and Prototyping table tracked feedback on samples, cost confirmations, minimum order quantities, financing, and packaging design as each product moved forward. The Product Approval table was where products got their identity: SKUs were created, GTIN codes recorded, prices set, tags added, and metafields filled in with details like size, weight, and slip ratings. Shipping rules were also set here.
The Production and Launch table brought together everything for the Shopify setup, DEAR integration, production tracking, photography, marketing prep, and sales distribution. Each team member had a view created for their role. For example, the person handling Shopify setup only saw products ready for that step, while the person doing final photography and descriptions saw what was ready for them. The operations team could see the whole pipeline, with status indicators showing where things stood.
Automation was the necessary step to solving the business’s problem. In the old workflow, someone had to remember to tell the next person when a product was ready for the next stage. Now, when a product is finished with Design and Prototyping and moved to Product Approval, tasks are automatically assigned to the right person for SKUs, pricing, and metadata, with all the needed information already included from earlier steps.
At the Shopify setup stage, the right person received a notification with the tile name, supplier details, color, size, and all the fields already filled in. The same happened for the final photography and setup stage—the notification included supplier specs, dimensions, slip ratings, and everything needed to write descriptions and set up the product correctly.
This changed how the team worked. People no longer wasted time waiting for updates. They could trust the system to let them know when something required their attention. The operations lead could finally see the schedule clearly, track how many products were in each stage, spot bottlenecks, and consider if a launch date was realistic.
One of the things that made this project go as smoothly as it did was the team’s attitude throughout. The team knew what wasn’t working and was open to change. The training covered each workflow in detail, explained the automated features, and showed everyone how to use their views. The documentation gave them a reference they could check anytime without needing to ask for help
