Case Study: AI Transforms RFQ Processing for Commercial Flooring Business

The Challenge

Designs4You receives 10+ inbound Requests for Quotes (RFQs) every day from commercial clients. Each RFQ arrives via email, often with attachments in varying formats: Excel spreadsheets, PDFs, photos of site conditions, and embedded images. Some include structured data tables. Others are free-text emails with photos attached.

Previously, a member of the office team would open each email, read through the content, identify the customer, extract the key details (site address, contact information, work description, order references), and manually type all of this into their project management system. This took approximately 20 minutes per RFQ when accounting for the full process of reading, interpreting, cross-referencing the customer database, and entering the data.

With 10+ RFQs arriving daily, this manual processing consumed hours of staff time. At peak periods, the backlog meant quotes could take up to 2 weeks to send, simply because the team could not process the incoming requests fast enough. This was not a speed problem. It was a capacity problem that was throttling the company's growth.

What We Built

We designed and deployed an AI-powered RFQ processing automation that monitors a dedicated email inbox, intelligently extracts data from any format, and creates structured projects in Airtable, all within 90 seconds of the email arriving.

How it works:

The automation monitors a dedicated RFQ inbox via Microsoft Outlook. When an email arrives, it splits out all attachments and routes each one through the right extraction pipeline based on file type: spreadsheets, PDFs, Word documents, and even photos or screenshots, which are processed through vision AI to extract readable text. All attachments are uploaded to the cloud for permanent access from within Airtable.

The combined email and attachment content is then analysed by AI to extract structured project data: customer name, order number, site details, work description, contacts, and more. Each field receives a confidence score, and the system automatically matches the RFQ to the correct customer account using email domain matching, fuzzy company name matching, and site customer matching.

From there, smart routing takes over:

• High-confidence RFQs are auto-created as projects in Airtable, with a confirmation notification sent to the team
• Lower-confidence RFQs are flagged for human review, with clear indicators showing which fields need attention

Every run is logged for audit and performance tracking.

Key Results

• Processing time: Under 90 seconds per RFQ, down from approximately 20 minutes
• Time saved per RFQ: Around 15 minutes, a 75% reduction
• Daily time saved: 2.5+ hours at a rate of 10 RFQs per day
• Weekly time saved: 12.5+ hours of staff capacity unlocked
• Formats handled: Emails, spreadsheets, PDFs, images, and photos
• Human oversight: Confidence-based routing keeps humans in control
• Capacity unlocked: Staff time redirected to quoting, customer relationships, and growth activities

Human-in-the-Loop Design

This automation was designed with human oversight built in, not bolted on. The confidence scoring system means:

• High-confidence RFQs are processed automatically, with a notification email confirming what was created. Staff can review and adjust if needed.
• Lower-confidence RFQs are flagged for review, with clear indicators showing exactly which fields need human attention. The project is still created in Airtable, but marked with a review status.

The team always has full visibility and control. The automation handles the repetitive extraction and data entry. Humans retain strategic oversight and final decisions.

Client Perspective

"The amount of time we were spending just getting RFQs into the system was ridiculous. Now it happens automatically, and the data that comes through is actually more accurate and consistent than when we were doing it by hand. The team can focus on the actual work rather than typing things into a screen all day."

— Ricky Stoltzman, CEO, Designs4You

Technical Stack

n8n workflow automation (36-node production workflow), Claude AI via OpenRouter (intelligent data extraction and OCR), Microsoft Outlook integration (email trigger and notifications), Airtable API (project creation and customer matching), Cloudinary (attachment hosting and management), custom confidence scoring and routing logic.

What Comes Next

RFQ processing is the first automation in Designs4You's roadmap. With structured project data now flowing into Airtable automatically, the next phases will build on this foundation:

• Phase 2: Automated quoting from a standardised pricing engine
• Phase 3: End-to-end project management and sign-off workflows
• Phase 4: Automated invoicing triggered by project completion

Each phase multiplies the value of what came before. The RFQ data feeds directly into quoting, which feeds into project management, which triggers invoicing. It is a compounding return on the foundational investment.