How much should a small business spend on EDI?
When a large customer says "we work over EDI", a small supplier's first instinct is to shop for an expensive integration package. That is usually a premature decision.
Start with volume
The question that decides it: how many documents will you send and receive per month?
| Volume | A sensible approach |
|---|---|
| Under 50 a month | View the file and process it by hand |
| 50-500 a month | Semi-automatic: file to spreadsheet, spreadsheet to system |
| 500+ a month | Full integration starts to pay for itself |
|---|
For a supplier receiving twenty orders a month, full automation will not repay its setup and maintenance cost for years.
Where the money goes
An EDI setup spends in three places:
- Transport — per-transaction fees with a VAN; fixed infrastructure cost
with SFTP or AS2
- Software — a translator licence or a SaaS subscription
- Setup and maintenance — the hidden one; every time the partner changes
version or adds a field, there is work to do
The third is routinely underestimated. An integration is not something you build once and forget.
Moving in stages
A practical path:
1. Read — open the incoming file, understand it, process it by hand 2. Export — pull the line items into a spreadsheet and load them in bulk 3. Automate — move to integration when volume demands it
The first two steps can be done with free tools, and plenty of companies stay at that level for years. Your customer cares whether you respond correctly, not how you processed the file.
When to automate
The signal is simple: when the time spent handling files by hand, the cost of mistakes, or the delays start turning into customer complaints. Until then, the money you do not spend stays in the business.