How GrowGeneration Improved Shipping Efficiency with NetSuite and FreightPOP

As companies scale across locations, channels, and customer types, shipping operations often become more complex than anticipated. What once worked for a smaller network can quickly lead to rising costs, manual processes, and limited visibility as volumes grow.

GrowGeneration, the nation’s largest chain of specialty hydroponic and organic garden centers, faced this exact challenge. Rapid expansion across retail and wholesale channels increased shipping complexity and made it difficult to manage costs, carrier coordination, and operational efficiency within existing systems.

In this blog, we tell the story of how GrowGeneration addressed those challenges by centralizing and integrating its freight operations.

Who is GrowGeneration 

GrowGeneration operates a large, multi-channel distribution and fulfillment network serving both commercial growers and hobbyists. With continued growth across locations and sales channels, the organization needed a shipping strategy that could scale without adding unnecessary manual effort or headcount.

As order volumes increased, so did the complexity of managing multiple carriers, freight modes, and service requirements—especially within a NetSuite-based environment.

Their Shipping Challenges

Before improving its shipping operations, GrowGeneration faced several challenges common to fast-growing organizations:

• Manual quoting: Carrier-by-carrier rate comparisons were performed outside of NetSuite, slowing order processing and increasing the risk of errors.

• Limited cost transparency: Fragmented data across carriers made it difficult to understand true freight costs and select the most cost-effective shipping options.

• Scheduling and partner coordination: Carrier and 3PL coordination relied heavily on emails and spreadsheets, creating inefficiencies and delays.

• Freight recovery challenges: Gaps between billed charges and actual costs made it difficult to identify and recover overcharges.

• Disconnected NetSuite workflows: Shipping steps were not fully integrated, requiring re-entry of information and manual status lookups.

Together, these issues limited visibility, slowed execution, and made it harder to control freight spend as the business continued to grow.

The Need for Integration and Automation

To support ongoing expansion, GrowGeneration needed more than incremental improvements. The team required a centralized, automated shipping solution that could integrate seamlessly with NetSuite, eliminate manual quoting, and provide clear visibility into freight costs and carrier performance.

The goal was to improve efficiency and decision-making without increasing operational overhead—ensuring shipping operations could scale alongside the business.

Centralizing Shipping Execution

By implementing an integrated freight management approach, GrowGeneration was able to streamline shipping workflows and bring transportation execution into a single, connected process.

Key improvements included:

• NetSuite integration: Orders, tracking information, freight costs, and invoices synced directly between shipping systems and NetSuite, reducing manual data entry and errors.

• Automated execution: Booking, label and BOL creation, and documentation were generated directly from NetSuite in one workflow.

• Rate shopping: Parcel, LTL, and FTL rates could be compared across connected carriers in seconds, supporting better mode and carrier selection.

• Centralized tracking: Real-time shipment status and delivery updates were available across all modes and carriers.

• Invoice auditing: Freight invoices were automatically compared against contracted rates and accessorials, helping flag discrepancies before posting.

This integrated approach replaced fragmented tools and manual processes with a streamlined, scalable shipping operation.

Results: Measurable Impact on Shipping Operations

By integrating FreightPOP directly with NetSuite and centralizing shipping execution, GrowGeneration achieved measurable improvements across productivity, cost control, and return on investment.

Key results included:

• 2× increase in shipping productivity, driven by automated quoting, booking, and documentation within NetSuite

• $500,000 in annual freight cost reduction (run rate) through improved rate shopping, invoice auditing, and cost visibility

• 10× return on investment, achieved by reducing manual effort while improving freight spend control and execution consistency

With shipping workflows fully integrated into NetSuite, GrowGeneration was able to scale operations more efficiently—improving performance without adding headcount or operational complexity.