Sports Basement achieves 99% expense compliance in 3 months using Brex.

Too much manual work, missing rewards, and insufficient control

Managing finances across 13 retail locations and a corporate headquarters presented significant challenges for Sports Basement. Their previous credit card solution was holding them back with its clunky interface and lack of spend controls.

Will Oldehoff, Director of Finance, faced constant frustration with the system: "I often discovered expenses only after they had occurred and spent hours manually tracking down receipts for reconciliation," says Will. "At one point, I even discovered that a manager at a newer location was about to use Venmo to pay a carpenter — a potential tax nightmare!"

The company also struggled to collect rightfully deserved credit card rewards on purchases from major vendors like Amazon and Costco. Their previous card provider couldn't capture the complex receipt data (L2 and L3 data) needed to verify purchases, resulting in denied rewards. This forced Sports Basement to sometimes make purchasing decisions based on reward eligibility, often leading to higher per-item costs.

Brex cards with higher rewards, built-in controls, and automated expense reporting

In March 2023, Sports Basement became a Brex customer, initially attracted by Brex's comprehensive rewards program. Will was particularly impressed by Brex's proprietary payment processing rails, which could access the complex receipt data needed to guarantee rewards on all vendor spending.

Sports Basement also implemented Brex expense management software, recognizing the potential for significant company-wide savings through Brex's robust and automated controls

Will says implementation was remarkably straightforward. Right away, Will started issuing cards to the corporate office and senior staff members at each store location, giving them weekly recurring spend limits. To effortlessly control their spending and ensure policy compliance, he embedded the company’s expense policy directly in the spend limits. This allowed him to enforce guardrails on amount, category, and other factors, as well as require documentation on purchases above specific thresholds — all automatically.

Will also created dedicated virtual cards for each of Sports Basement's vendors, a strategic move that enhanced security and flexibility. "Having different virtual cards per vendor means if a card is compromised, we don't need to replace cards with every vendor," Will explains. "We also don't have to wait weeks for a new physical card to be delivered. Now it's really quick to spin up another card because each vendor has its own dedicated card number."

Will’s team sets custom limits for each vendor card based on expected spending patterns and gets automatically alerted if a vendor approaches their limit, prompting discussion about budget adjustments when necessary.

“Tracking receipts is night and day with Brex. It's all automated.”

— Will Oldehoff, Director of Finance, Sports Basement

99% compliance, cost savings, and real-time visibility

Within just three months of implementing Brex, Sports Basement experienced dramatic improvements. Employee compliance skyrocketed to 99% thanks to the cards’ built-in expense policies and automated expense reporting. And tedious receipt chasing became a thing of the past. "Tracking receipts is night and day," Will says. "For online purchases, employees can just forward their email receipt straight to the receipts inbox. For any paper receipts, the notifications are huge — text, push notifications, email — I don't have to do the outreach myself. It's all automated." Employees simply take a picture of their receipt and reply to the reminder — Brex automatically matches it to the right expense. Brex also automatically generates receipts for over 3,000 major merchants, such as Uber and DoorDash.

Employees were further empowered by Brex’s easy spend requests feature. When employees need to make purchases outside their normal patterns, Will appreciates that “they can easily jump into the Brex app and request an increased limit.” The requests get routed to the appropriate approver, ensuring compliance without creating bottlenecks.

Sports Basement also gained real-time visibility into spending, transforming financial oversight. "The reporting in Brex is super helpful. I can quickly and easily visualize spend," notes Will. Using Brex's detailed reporting, Will identified opportunities to adjust spend limits for employees who weren't approaching their limits, creating a more realistic picture of estimated spending and allowing capital to be redeployed where it’s needed most. The visibility also led to $75,000 in cost savings: "We can see where people are spending and could get better deals,” Will said. “For instance, we can see how much more Uline costs than Amazon. Plus, I think people are generally hesitant to make extravagant purchases when there is more visibility into what they're spending.”

Will also appreciates Brex's responsive support team: "Brex support is exceptional, even during off-hours. Any time I have questions or need assistance, I know I can count on getting help quickly 24/7." With Brex, Sports Basement has transformed its financial operations from a source of frustration to a strategic advantage, allowing the team to focus more energy on what they do best — serving their community and providing exceptional sporting goods and experiences.