How FRICKE optimizes search in B2B e-commerce with HOLMES

FRICKE Group is one of the leading spare parts dealers in the agritech sector in Europe. With GRANIT PARTS, its signature brand, the company sells a huge range of products for agricultural and construction machinery as well as commercial vehicles. The company generates over 50% of its turnover internationally. As of 2025 more than 97% is transacted via the B2B platform.

Initial situation at FRICKE:

• more than 97 % of sales are made via the online shop

• 70% of all purchases start with a search

• Existing search solution could only be controlled via development, was not sufficiently error-tolerant in important product ranges and sometimes delivered inadequate results

• Very limited ability to influence ranking, relevance or sorting

• Growth plans in international markets, especially with multilingual requirements

Solution approach with HOLMES:

• Selection of HOLMES as the base accelerator platform for new search

• Rebuild the entire search logic and business rules in close collaboration with FRICKE

• Staggered rollout including A/B test to assess actual impact of proposed solution

• platform-wide rollout starting with Germany

Result with HOLMES at FRICKE:

• +10 % increase in the search conversion rate

• +20 % improvement in product position in search results

• -30 % fewer searches without hits

Product search: from pain point to priority

With no possibility for fine-grained control and with basic influence on relevance or ranking: FRICKE's existing search solution had reached its limits.

In B2B with its complex requirements, an inadequate search solution for a growing digital business poses a high risk. "Our article numbers are key for our customers. For search to be able to understand the complex logic behind these numbers is essential to cater the right products to our customers" says Christoph Wege.

We launched our HOLMES search solution at FRICKE to respond to these special requirements.

HOLMES: The answer to B2B search requirements

HOLMES is a fault-tolerant and powerful search solution that can be integrated easily into your existing IT landscape.

HOLMES is the ideal solution for B2B e-commerce businesses and offers:

• An intuitive backend for independent control of the search logic

• High-performance results even with millions of items in the product catalog

• Flexible integration into the existing IT landscape

• Low operating costs without license commitment

• A great base for AI search with semantic ranking

The introduction of HOLMES was carried out in close cooperation between FRICKE and neuland: first we setup and tested the system with test data using real search terms - with daily exchanges between FRICKE and neuland teams. Christoph Wege summarizes the collaboration: "I always enjoy working with neuland. It's not a regular service provider relationship. We develop solutions together, with a hands-on mentality, without quick development cycles and a real understanding of our concerns."

During the subsequent controlled A/B live test in the GRANIT store with real user inquiries, up to 50% of the traffic was gradually redirected to HOLMES in order to make an informed decision based on the key figures:

"HOLMES managed to map the searches with our special article numbers made up of combinations of numbers and letters much better. That was the game changer for us."

Results: HOLMES delivers in live operation

FRICKE was able to achieve the following results with the help of HOLMES:

• +10 % increase in conversion rate

• +20 % improvement in product position in search results

• -30 % fewer searches without hits

The optimization results are incredibly positive for FRICKE. HOLMES exceeded expectations: "We were delighted that HOLMES was able to achieve such a strong uplift," says Christoph Wege.

In the following excerpts, you can gain an insight into the operation and handling of HOLMES.

Performance in a sustainable way: HOLMES is certified with the Blue Angel ecolabel

In addition to performance and flexibility, HOLMES also scores highly in the area of digital sustainability. It is the first commercial search solution in Germany to be awarded the Blue Angel ecolabel for software.

What sets HOLMES apart:

• Full transparency of resource consumption

• Low infrastructure costs thanks to powerful architecture

• Full user autonomy through access to source code and data

• Free security updates

• Lean software instead of feature overload

International rollout with HOLMES

Today one thing is clear: HOLMES will be used in the GRANIT store in the long term. After rolling out in Germany FRICKE will introduce HOLMES across all brands and online stores in its global B2B platform.