What ERP does a 10 person shop need?

Three of the five below is enough. Waiting costs you the margin you cannot see, which is more than the software fee you are saving.

• Two or more people change the same stock numbers and the count drifts.
• You cannot say what last month's biggest job cost until the accountant tells you.
• Purchase orders are raised from memory and material arrives late or twice.
• Quotes are based on the last quote rather than the last job's real cost.
• A customer asks for a certificate or inspection record and it takes a day to find.

Do not try to run everything in month one. A 10 person shop has one person doing the setup in spare hours, so order matters.

• Items and opening stock, with units and reorder points for the top fifty items.
• Bills of materials for the products or job types you make most.
• Work orders with routing steps and a printed job card.
• Purchase orders and receipts, so stock arrives through the system.
• Job costing once material issues and labour are flowing, usually month two or three.
• Quality records and accounting after the operational data is trusted.

Avoid any system priced for a project team you do not have. A product that needs a partner to configure it, a server to host it or a month of consulting to go live will stall at a shop this size, because the person doing the setup also runs the shop. Avoid long contracts before you have run a real job in the system. Avoid products with no self-serve export; at 10 people you will change systems at least once more as you grow, and your data must come with you. Finally, avoid buying for the 100 person company you hope to be; buy for the 20 person company you will be in two years.

Small-shop ERPs are priced per user, per bundle of users, or as a flat monthly fee with limits on records or features. Per-user pricing is cheapest at three seats and grows as you add operators. Bundles step up in blocks. Flat fees are predictable but can hide limits you hit at month six. Whichever model it is, price three years with the seats you expect, ask what is in the free period if there is one, and check whether annual billing is required. Setup help, training and data import are often extra, so ask for them in writing.