Flieber vs Excel: How to Compete Against Non-Consumption (Not Competitors)

 

Flieber vs Excel: How to Compete Against Non-Consumption (Not Competitors)

Most B2B founders obsess over competitors. Fabricio Miranda obsesses over Excel spreadsheets.

In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Fabricio Miranda, CEO and Co-Founder of Flieber, articulated a competitive strategy that sounds counterintuitive: every company that adopts any inventory planning system—even a competitor’s—is a win.

“We fight against Excel spreadsheets. Almost all of the brands use Excel spreadsheets,” Fabricio explains. “So each different brand that migrates to a inventory planning system is a win for the whole category.”

This isn’t altruism. It’s recognition that the real competition isn’t other startups. It’s inertia.

The Non-Consumption Problem

In most B2B categories, you’re fighting for market share. Customer A uses Competitor B. Your job is to convince them to switch.

But when you’re creating a new category, the dynamics are different. Most potential customers aren’t using anyone’s solution.

“Almost all of the brands use Excel spreadsheets” isn’t just market research. It’s the competitive landscape.

The math matters. If 90% of your addressable market uses Excel and 10% uses inventory planning platforms, you’re not competing for 10%. You’re competing to convert the 90%.

Why Excel Is the Wrong Tool

Fabricio is careful about how he frames the Excel problem.

“I still dream with the day that people understand that Excel spreadsheets are amazing. I’m the biggest Excel geek. I use Excel every single day for everything I do. But Excel spreadsheets are just not the right tool to solve the complexities of inventory planning.”

Excel isn’t bad. It’s just bad for this specific job.

“Excel is great as something that you’re going to use in the end to make final analysis based on the final results, things like that. But it’s not the right tool to get all the data needed and process all that data and make all the complex calculations.”

So why do companies persist? Because switching costs aren’t just financial. They’re organizational, cultural, and psychological.

Excel is familiar. Everyone knows how to use it. It’s infinitely flexible. It doesn’t require vendor relationships.

These aren’t irrational reasons. They’re just insufficient when managing inventory across multiple channels and warehouses with lead times measured in weeks or months.

The Category Expansion Strategy

Here’s where Fabricio’s thinking diverges from typical competitive strategy:

“Each different brand that migrates to a inventory planning system is a win for the whole category. So everybody wins because now the paradigm is not anymore Excel versus inventory planning is which inventory planning system is better for me.”

When a company moves from Excel to any inventory planning system, they’re making several changes:

First, acknowledging that inventory planning requires purpose-built software. That’s a mental model shift.

Second, allocating budget that previously didn’t exist. That’s a financial shift.

Third, changing organizational workflows around data integration and decision-making. That’s an operational shift.

Once a company makes these shifts, switching between inventory planning systems is a procurement decision, not organizational transformation.

What This Means for GTM

If your real competition is non-consumption, your GTM strategy looks different.

Traditional competitive positioning focuses on why you’re better than Alternative X. Feature comparisons. Pricing structures.

But when you’re competing against Excel, none of that matters to most of your market. They’re not comparing inventory planning platforms. They’re questioning whether they need one at all.

Fabricio’s content strategy reflects this. “What I worry the most in my role today is a lot less about selling Flieber and a lot more about showing people what I think they should be doing. Based on my experience and what I see from our customers, what happens to our customers and Flieber is just a consequence.”

The goal isn’t to convince someone to choose Flieber over Competitor X. It’s to convince them that Excel isn’t solving their problem.

“In the ideal world, I don’t sell Flieber, I sell the idea. And Flieber is just a consequence in that process.”

The Long Game

Category expansion strategies require patience. Converting a market from non-consumption takes longer than capturing share.

Fabricio’s vision accounts for this. His long-term goal isn’t market dominance. It’s shifting what the category competes against.

“I hope we get to that world where I’m going to come back here and say, hey, my competitor now is not Excel anymore, is XYZ.”

When your competitor shifts from Excel to “XYZ” (another named platform), the category has matured. Companies are choosing between platforms, not questioning whether they need platforms at all.

At that point, competition becomes about product features and pricing. All solvable problems. But you can’t get there until the market accepts that the category should exist.

Why Competitors Help You

This is the least intuitive part: your “competitors” are actually helping you.

Every case study they publish proves the category works. Every customer they convert educates the market about why Excel isn’t sufficient.

“So everybody wins because now the paradigm is not anymore Excel versus inventory planning is which inventory planning system is better for me. So they are already kind of converted into using a system.”

The converted customer who chose Competitor X understands the value proposition. They’ve allocated budget. They’ve changed workflows. If unhappy, switching to you is a procurement decision.

The unconverted prospect using Excel doesn’t understand the value proposition. They have no budget. They have entrenched workflows. Converting them requires education, proof, and organizational change management.

The Takeaway

If you’re building in a new category, the critical question isn’t “how do we beat Competitor X?” It’s “what percentage of our addressable market is solving this problem with purpose-built solutions versus makeshift alternatives?”

If that percentage is low—if most use spreadsheets or manual processes—you’re competing against non-consumption.

That changes everything. Your content isn’t about why you’re better. It’s about why solving this problem matters. Your sales conversations aren’t feature comparisons. They’re about the cost of the status quo.

And every customer win by anyone in your category helps you. Because they’re converting the market from non-consumption to consumption.

“My future dream is to finally have all these people who are today using Excel migrating to inventory planning platforms. Not only Flieber, we can be one of our competitors, but the market maturing enough so that people understand that Excel is great as something that you’re going to use in the end to make final analysis.”

That’s category expansion thinking. Win by growing the pie, not fighting over slices.