The Challenge

União Materiais para Construção is a construction materials retailer built on a foundation of customer service and operational hustle. The company serves both retail customers and wholesale partners, offering everything from basic building supplies to specialty finishing products. For years, this hands-on approach worked well.

However, as the business grew, the cracks began to show. Financial data lived in multiple spreadsheets. Sales forecasts were rough estimates. Inventory decisions were made without clear visibility into margins. The team couldn't answer basic questions quickly: What's our actual cash position? Which products are truly profitable? Are we on track to hit our targets?

"We had numbers everywhere," one leader reflected, "but no single source of truth. Every decision felt like we were flying blind."

The real problem wasn't complexity—it was fragmentation. Compras (purchasing), vendas (sales), and finanças (finance) operated in silos. A sale would happen, but the margin impact wouldn't be clear for weeks. Inventory would pile up in slow-moving categories while high-margin items ran short. Tax obligations and supplier payments created cash crunches that felt unpredictable.

The company was growing, but profitability was inconsistent. Margins fluctuated. EBITDA swung between positive and negative. The team knew something had to change, but they weren't sure where to start.

The Solution

The leadership team made a deliberate choice: stop managing by intuition. Start managing by data.

The transformation began with a simple but powerful idea: integrate financial planning with daily operations. Instead of separate systems for inventory, receivables, and cash flow, the company built a unified balanço financeiro (financial balance sheet) that fed directly into a DRE de gestão (management income statement). Every day, key metrics were updated. Every month, the full picture came into focus.

"We needed one dashboard that told us everything," the finance lead explained. "Not ten spreadsheets. One truth."

The team implemented several interconnected solutions:

Integrated Financial Planning. A consolidated spreadsheet brought together inventory levels, accounts receivable, accounts payable, and bank balances. This was updated daily and closed monthly, creating a clear picture of cash position and profitability. Suddenly, the team could see exactly where money was going and when cash would be tight.

Disciplined Purchasing. Compras shifted from reactive to planned. The company established a fixed cadence—purchases every Tuesday morning—and tied buying decisions to forecasted sales and target margins. A simple rule: don't buy more than the margin-based budget allows. This reduced excess inventory and improved cash flow.

Sales Pipeline Visibility. The team built a structured orçamento (budget) and pipeline system. Every quote, every negotiation, every possible sale was tracked with clear next steps. This transformed sales from a black box into a predictable process.

Cost Governance. Each expense line got an owner. Someone was responsible for energy, someone for maintenance, someone for freight. Monthly reviews compared actual spending to budget. Deviations triggered conversations, not surprises.

Data Quality. The team cleaned up customer databases, standardized product codes, and created consistent naming conventions. This sounds boring, but it was essential. Bad data leads to bad decisions.

The cultural shift was just as important as the tools. Leadership committed to weekly reviews of key metrics. Sales, operations, and finance started talking to each other. When a margin dipped, the team didn't blame external factors—they dug into the data to understand why.

"The biggest change was mindset," one manager noted. "We went from 'that's just how it is' to 'let's look at the numbers and fix it.'"

The Transformation

The results came faster than expected.

Within the first few months, the company achieved a 9% increase in monthly revenue. More importantly, margins stabilized. The contribution margin held steady at 48%, and EBITDA swung from negative to solidly positive. Interest payments to suppliers dropped dramatically—from thousands per month to just a few hundred—because cash flow was predictable and the company could pay on time.

Inventory management improved. The company maintained a lean stock of approximately R$ 40,000 while virtually eliminating stockouts. The mix of products shifted: basic, low-margin items dropped from 84% of purchases to 70%, while higher-margin finishing products gained share.

Supplier relationships strengthened. With better cash flow visibility, the company negotiated extended payment terms—from 84 days to 140 days with key suppliers. This freed up working capital and reduced pressure on daily cash management.

The sales team became more effective. With a clear pipeline and structured follow-up process, the team could focus on high-value opportunities. The program of financing options (parcelamento via cartão) was introduced, and customer acceptance was immediate. This opened a new lever for conversion and customer recurrence.

But the numbers tell only part of the story. The real transformation was organizational. Decisions that once took days now took hours. The team moved from reactive firefighting to proactive planning. When challenges arose—a seasonal dip, a supplier issue, a margin pressure—the team had data to understand it and options to address it.

"We went from hoping things would work out to knowing what we needed to do," the operations lead said. "That's a completely different way of running a business."

The company also expanded into wholesale (atacado), serving construction companies and smaller retailers. This new channel required the same discipline—clear margins, inventory planning, and cash flow management—but the data systems were ready. The wholesale channel grew quickly because the company could offer competitive pricing while maintaining profitability.

Looking ahead, the company is positioned for sustainable growth. The financial discipline is embedded in daily operations. The team understands margins, cash flow, and profitability at a granular level. New initiatives—like a lean SKU strategy focused on top-performing items and a targeted marketing program—are being evaluated with clear metrics and realistic expectations.

"We're not just bigger," the CEO reflected. "We're smarter. We know our business now. And that changes everything."

The journey from fragmented operations to integrated, data-driven management wasn't quick or painless. But it transformed União Materiais para Construção from a company managing by instinct into one that manages by insight. And that's the foundation for the next phase of growth.