Recipe for success: Churros Republic and their e-invoicing journey

By Kami Navarro

From standalone stalls to full-service restaurants, food & beverage (F&B) establishments need to be run like a tight ship. To keep customers happy, establishment owners and employees need to efficiently take orders, maintain adequate supplies of ingredients and much, much more—all while cooking up and serving a tasty meal.

It comes as no surprise then that over one-third of F&B outlets in Singapore have adopted at least one technology solution to improve productivity.

Well-loved local dessert spot Churros Republic is one such outlet that has taken the digital leap.

In a bid to make their operations more efficient, the company made the switch to e-invoicing last year, taking advantage of the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA)’s Nationwide E-invoicing Network.

Here’s a look at the humble beginnings of Churros Republic and how e-invoicing has helped them increase productivity.

A taste of Spain in Singapore

Churros Republic was founded by Mr Faizar Hussein, who is also currently the company’s CEO. Like most kids, Mr Hussein grew up with quite the sweet tooth. “I was no stranger to desserts,” he admitted. “I spent 12 years chasing all things delicious.”

Soon enough, he stumbled upon his current obsession: churros. Traditionally eaten as a snack in Spain and Portugal, churros are made by deep-frying dough until it forms a crunchy, golden and intensely fragrant pastry dusted with sugar and accompanied by a dessert sauce.

“The perfect Spanish churros are crispy on the outside and soft on the inside,” explained Mr Hussein. Alas, some of his earlier efforts were too crispy, too hard or too soggy. After countless failed experiments, he finally arrived at the best recipe and gathered the courage to turn his churro obsession into a business.

Starting out with a small stall in Bugis before venturing into live station catering, Mr Hussein eventually opened Churros Republic’s flagship outlet at Our Tampines Hub in January 2019.

Beyond their selection of gourmet sauces like dulce de leche and nutella, the outlet features a creative menu with mouthwatering handcrafted confections such as the creme brulee churro that has custard, blueberries and strawberry jam.

E-invoicing saves the day

Like many other business owners in Singapore, he would issue invoices by extracting data from his accounting systems, formatting it as a printable document and sending it to his clients via paper or email.

Invoices were sometimes lost along the way and Mr Hussein spent a considerable time chasing his clients down for payments. Conversely, when he received invoices of his own, he had to painstakingly enter the information into his own system—a process that took up much time and effort, and was often accompanied by many errors. Hoping to speed up the process and get paid on time, Mr Hussein started to search for alternative invoicing methods.

At that point last year, IMDA had just implemented the Nationwide E-invoicing Network. Unlike manual invoicing, where usually PDF invoices are sent across via email to the other party, the Nationwide E-invoicing Network allows for sending of invoices directly to the accounting systems—speeding up the process as there is no need for manual data entry and reducing human errors.

From zero to Xero

Mr Hussein’s e-invoicing solution of choice is Xero, an online accounting software that allows his team at Churros Republic to easily send e-invoices to their customers’ systems.

On top of that, Xero allows the team to send automatic payment reminders to encourage their customers who order in bulk to pay on time.

But for Mr Hussein, perhaps the biggest time saver is the fact that Xero is also readily available as a mobile application. “With the iPhone version, I can view my cash flow, access customer and vendor information and create invoices. Accounting has gone mobile!” he enthused.