How van Cronenburg Improved Product Data with Pimics

Client spotlight

van Cronenburg is a Belgian company specializing in the design and production of architectural hardware and Kitchen & Bath products, including door handles, hinges, pulls, Spouts, Tap Knobs and much more. Their products are known for their timeless design and historical character, making them a popular choice for restoration projects, heritage interiors, and architect-led concepts where every detail matters. This attention to detail extends beyond the products themselves: to support the decision-making process, product information must be presented clearly and precisely, anticipating the need for reliable technical and design product data at every stage of a project.

The challenges:

Before Pimics, van Cronenburg managed product information in a more fragmented setup. During the move to Business Central, it became clear that the business needed a dedicated product information management layer to support richer data, reusable assets, and more reliable publishing outputs.

Main pain points:

• Digital assets were managed separately: Product images were stored on a separate SharePoint site, making asset management fragmented and hard to maintain.
• Reusing assets was difficult: The same image could not be easily attached to multiple items, which increased duplication and manual work.
• Feature management lacked flexibility: It was difficult to define product features efficiently or to assign them to multiple groups.
• Data quality control was manual: There were no checklists or built-in validation steps, so data quality depended only on manual checking.

To address these challenges, van Cronenburg looked for a solution that would bring product data, assets, and governance into one place. Our PIM solution Pimics was chosen primarily because of its native integration with Business Central and the capability of  providing other required PIM functionalities such as: metadata tracking, file attachments, item structure, API export options, or data quality checklists.

Implementation process

As Pimics is built inside Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, we implemented it in parallel with the ERP rollout, following this pragmatic sequence: 

• Define outputs: confirm what the catalogue and spec sheets must show, and what “publish-ready” means.
• Design the data model: categories, attributes (features/values), naming conventions, and required fields.
• Build workflows: enrichment responsibilities, validation steps, and publishing selections.
• Go live & scale: migrate items, train the owner team, and iterate based on real catalogue usage.

Working closely with van Cronenburg and their Business Central partner, we aligned the fields introduced during the ERP migration and translated them into a practical Pimics structure. This included catalogue-oriented fields, detailed descriptions, category logic, and a rule-based approach for combining selected features and values into outputs that are both structured for filtering and readable for end users.

Beyond rules, we supported van Cronenburg in establishing conventions that make large-scale product data manageable:
 

• Prefix-based category IDs to speed up navigation, filtering, and governance across the taxonomy.
• Feature and value code conventions (including prefixes) that help users immediately recognize attribute types and maintain consistency.
• Rule-driven enrichment as a repeatable method—reducing manual editing and improving output consistency over time.

Another important stream was aligning Pimics data with van Cronenburg’s web-to-Spec Sheet workflow. While their team built the web-based tooling around Sec sheet generation, we defined the product-data requirements and standardized the outputs—so customers can request a  digital leaflet for a specific product directly from the web catalogue, with consistent attributes and formatting-ready content delivered from Pimics.

The results:

Today, van Cronenburg works in a more structured and scalable product information environment. The gains are visible in both the size of the managed data and the ease of working with it.
 

• 15,000 items managed in Business Central and structured in Pimics categories
• 5,000+ items already published in the web catalogue
• 8,000 items supporting spec sheet generation

Just as important as the numbers is the operational shift. Product data and supporting assets are now easier to understand, maintain, and reuse. Instead of relying on fragmented files and manual checks, the team works with a more transparent setup that supports ongoing enrichment and consistent outputs.
  This case study shows that better product information management is about creating a system that supports richer data, easier collaboration, and long-term scalability. With Pimics, van Cronenburg was able to achieve that directly inside Business Central.

Key takeaways:

• One place for product data and assets with direct attachment and easier reuse
• More consistent data through inheritance, item groups, and checklists
• Faster publishing workflows
• A stronger foundation for growth inside Business Central

Looking for more structure and consistency in Business Central product data?

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