How The Cookie Box Replaced Spreadsheets and Manual Payroll with One Platform That Runs Four Stores

“I wouldn’t even imagine doing rosters on a spreadsheet. With the integration, it’s beautiful and seamless. It takes me half an hour to pay everyone.”

Gwen Guerin, Co-Owner

Key Results

• Payroll cut to 30 minutes across 28 staff each pay period, down from a fully manual process that required hours of data entry
  
• Accountant costs eliminated by bringing payroll in-house through Connecteam’s Xero integration
  
• One platform replaced separate systems for rostering, time tracking, food safety records, and team communication.
  

The Challenge: Running a Growing Business on Spreadsheets and Paper

Managing four stores and 28 casual staff from a single operations role is demanding enough without slow, manual systems slowing things down. When Gwen joined as co-owner three years ago, The Cookie Box was still tracking staff hours on handwritten sheets and managing rosters in spreadsheets.

1. Staff wrote their own hours by hand, creating room for error and requiring manual reconciliation before every payroll run
2. Rostering across multiple locations with no digital tool made scheduling slow and hard to communicate to staff
3. Payroll was handled externally by an accountant, adding unnecessary cost to an already lean operation

“They were still doing rosters and everything on spreadsheets. People were writing their time on a sheet and then we had to record all that.”

Gwen Guerin, Co-Owner

How The Cookie Box Uses Connecteam to Run a Tighter Multi-Location Operation

Gwen adopted Connecteam to digitize the core functions that were eating the most time: scheduling, time tracking, and payroll. As the business grew from 2 stores to 4 and from fewer than 10 staff to nearly 30, Connecteam scaled alongside it.

• Staff clock in and out through the app, with time data syncing directly to Xero each pay period through a native integration
• Connecteam Forms replaced paper-based food safety records, including fridge and product temperature logs, putting health and safety compliance in one searchable location
• Stock control data is captured through Connecteam Forms and piped into Power BI, eliminating the need for a separate stock management tool

“With the integration, it’s beautiful and seamless. It takes me half an hour to pay everyone.”

Gwen Guerin, Co-Owner

Results That Affect The Cookie Box’s Bottom Line

Payroll Done Faster, Without an Accountant

• Time data flows from Connecteam directly into Xero, removing the manual step of reconciling handwritten sheets
• Gwen runs payroll herself in around 30 minutes for the full team of 28, saving the ongoing cost of outsourcing to an accountant
• Staff engagement with the clock-in process is high, with employees finding the app easy to use from day one

One Platform Handling Operations Across Four Stores

• Forms cover daily food safety checks, fridge temperature logs, and product temperature records, keeping the business audit-ready without paper
• Team chats keep staff connected across locations, with questions answered by the team in real time
• All processes and troubleshooting guides live inside the app, giving floor staff a single place to check when issues come up

“They’re always super impressed that everything is in one place. All the processes, troubleshooting. It’s all in one place and that makes things a lot easier.”

Gwen Guerin, Co-Owner

Before vs. After Connecteam

Why Connecteam Was the Right Move

Gwen evaluated Deputy as an alternative but found the per-user pricing model difficult to manage for a business with casual staff and regular turnover. Connecteam’s flat-tier pricing and breadth of features, from forms to payroll integration to team chat, made it the clear choice for a business that needed one tool to do it all.