Ask in plain words. The agent rolls up the data, models it, builds the file and drafts the email, then stops where the decision is yours. Eight requests, filmed.
Last edited 7 min read
Every Spring account has an agent in it. It reads what you have connected and uploaded, does the arithmetic, builds the file and writes the email. Anything that commits you to something stays your click.
The fastest way to show what that means is to show it. Below are eight requests, from a one-line question to a chain that ends in three emails with three spreadsheets attached. The business in the clips is Driftwood Coffee Roasters, the demo company we film with: every number is made up, the totals add up, and nothing in them is sent anywhere.
Data in, emails out
The requests that save the most time are the ones that used to take an afternoon: pull the data, roll it up, decide, build the file, write to the people who need it. You can ask for the whole chain in one or two sentences.
“Which stores are about to run out?”
Driftwood drops its Q3 sell-through file into the chat: 2,184 rows, one per store per week. The agent turns that into one number per line, weeks of cover, which is stock on hand divided by what sells in a week, and charts every retailer and SKU from tightest to safest. Five lines are under three weeks. Cold Brew Concentrate at Whole Foods has 1.6.
The second request is the one that used to take the afternoon: build each buyer a reorder for six weeks of cover and email it to them. The agent works out the cases each line needs, rounds them up to full case packs, prices them at the wholesale list, and exports the result as three spreadsheets, one per retailer. Then it opens a draft for each buyer with that buyer's file attached, so Whole Foods never sees what Albertsons is ordering. You get three emails, 929 cases and $64.2k at wholesale, waiting for you to read them.
“How much have retailers deducted this year, and why?”
Deductions are the money a retailer keeps back from a payment: promotions, spoiled stock, cases it says never arrived, prices it says were wrong. They arrive as codes on remittances, one line at a time, which is why most brands never add them up. The agent does: $42.9k since January, more than half of it promotions, and UNFI takes the most.
Then the follow-up: which of these can we win back? The agent checks every short-ship and pricing claim against the signed proofs of delivery and the 2026 price list in your files. Seven claims contradict your own paperwork, worth $8.2k. It exports the backup for each retailer and drafts the disputes, one per retailer, each listing its claims and carrying its own file.
“What happens to cash if Albertsons pays late and we take the Whole Foods order?”
A forecast is most useful when you can push on it. Here the agent takes the 13-week forecast and changes two things: Albertsons pays its $38.2k invoice 30 days late, and Driftwood spends $46.5k making a holiday order for Whole Foods that pays 45 days after delivery. Both lines go on one chart. The base case never drops below $96k; the scenario bottoms out at $11.3k the week of November 23, $13.7k under the $25k Driftwood likes to keep in the bank, and recovers in January when Whole Foods pays.
Send it to my accountant as a PDF turns the chart and the table into a PDF and opens a draft to the accountant with it attached, asking the two questions that matter: is the timing right, and is financing the gap the right call.
Ask a question, get the arithmetic
Not every request needs to end in an email. Most start as a question you would otherwise answer with a spreadsheet and an hour.
“Which retailer actually makes us money?”
Revenue by retailer is easy to find. What is left after everything comes back out is not. The agent puts invoices, remittances and freight bills side by side and subtracts cost of goods, deductions, freight and financing fees from each retailer's revenue. Sprouts keeps 46 cents of every dollar. UNFI keeps 23.
Break UNFI down by SKU answers the next question before you ask it. Cold Brew Cans lose money at UNFI: $6,800 of their $21,700 in sales came back as deductions, which leaves the line about 5% under water.
“Update my cash flow forecast”
The agent reads the bank accounts and books you have connected and paints the next 13 weeks: the balance you actually had, then the one it projects, with money in and money out laid out week by week. Then it says what it found in one sentence, so you do not have to read the chart to know where the low point is.
A feed cannot see everything. A production run you have agreed but not yet been billed for, or a payment that is about to stop, lives in your head, not your bank. So the agent asks about those, one question at a time, and moves the forecast as each answer lands.
“What’s the status of my NOAs?”
A Notice of Assignment tells a retailer to pay Spring for the invoices we fund (what a notice is and why it exists). The agent puts every notice in one sheet: the retailer, where its notice stands, and the next step, whether that is signing it or opening the signed copy.
Follow-ups work the way they would with a person. “Just the ones that have been acknowledged” narrows the same sheet; you do not start again.
The everyday ones
“Email distributors who would be interested in selling my product”
The agent picks two specialty distributors that fit the category, KeHE and UNFI, opens a draft for each in its own tab, and writes them: recipient, subject, then a short note in the brand's voice.
“Help me connect my bank account and QuickBooks”
Your business and owner details are already on file, so the agent skips them and opens your application at the step that is left: connections. You pick your bank and sign in through Plaid, which gives Spring read-only access. QuickBooks comes next in the same flow; the clip stops at the bank.
What it will not do
- Send for you. The clips above draft eight emails and send none. Each one is its own email to one recipient, written for them, with only their file attached. It waits until you have read it, changed what you want, and clicked Send. There is no bulk send.
- Act without you. Notices and funding requests are drafted, filled in and laid out for you. Signing and submitting are your clicks.
- Guess at what it cannot see. When the answer depends on something no account or file shows, it asks.
- Reach past your account. It works from what you have connected and uploaded, and only for your business.
Try it
The agent is in every Spring account at app.spring.ai. Type into “Ask anything”, or tap the microphone and say it. Drop a spreadsheet into the chat and ask about it. If you do not have an account yet, get started here.