Project Overview
Woodland Trust partnered with Transparity to develop cloud-based grant management software using bespoke App Innovation solutions on Power Apps. Built after a 2020 cyberattack disrupted processes, the system connected back-end data with customer workflows, enabling administrators to review and progress applications, automate emails, generate documents, and allocate nursery stock.
The apps streamlined UK-wide tree planting schemes, handling more than 12,000 applications—including 8,831 for schools and community groups—and supporting plans to deliver 1.3 million trees while reducing duplication and improving efficiency.
The Challenge
After a devastating cyberattack in 2020, The Woodland Trust needed to get back to operations as quickly as possible. They were relying on manual, time-consuming processes to connect their tree nurseries with orders and dispatch. Inefficiencies in the process not only wasted employee time, but left gaps for errors, miscommunication, and confusion.
With new nation-wide tree planting initiatives coming up, the team needed to get their new infrastructure up and running quickly. Driven by tight timescales and the volume of work needed to recover from the cyberattack, The Woodland Trust turned to Transparity to deliver a solution. With 16 Gold Accreditations and 10 Advanced Specialisations, they knew our experts were ready to deliver the apps they needed quickly and reliably.
The Solution
Using PowerApps we developed several bespoke apps to link complex back-end processes with customers, to enable the easy administration of UK-wide tree planting initiatives. The first is an admin app for The Woodland Trust’s Free Trees for Schools and Communities scheme.
The app allows their team to review all applications made through the website and amend them if needed. The status can be updated to move the application through the process from initial application to placing the order with the nursery with automated email confirmations along the way. We also created a series of four apps to enable The Woodland Trust to administer their planting schemes for landowners and farmers with similar functionality to the Free Trees app.
Viewing and amending application details, along with templated document generation sit within a central Admin App. This connects with an app to record the tree order associated with each scheme, and a pair of back-office apps to provide an overview of stock use, delivery bookings, and to identify species mixes for hedgerow planting schemes. The apps connect with The Woodland Trust’s internal databases which govern which trees they have in nurseries available for supply. This stock information is pulled through and allocated to customer applications with an order form generated by Power Automate flows within the App.
The Outcome
These apps have enabled The Woodland Trust to become more efficient, improve user experience and have allowed their teams to focus on growing their conservation work without being held back by their infrastructure. Senior Project Leads noted the deployment of the apps has made admin processes more intuitive than ever with scheme data presented clearly, filtering irrelevant data based on the task at hand and removing duplicate data entry.
Just these two initiatives involved over 12,000 applications, to plant over 1.8 million trees and 100,000 metres of hedgerow. The Free Trees App enabled the team to process 4,477 applications from schools and 4,354 from community groups. Those 8,831 applications will result in 1.3 million trees being delivered to schools and community groups between November 2021 and April 2022.
The apps that enable the planting schemes for landowners and farmers have also had some impressive results, handling a total of 3,283 applications since go-live. This breaks down into four main projects across the UK; MOREwoods, Crofting MOREwoods, Our Trees for Your Farm and MOREhedges. Combined, these projects will deliver 362 hectares of woodland, 542,065 trees and 500,000 hedgerow shrubs between October 2021 and May 2022.
The development of the apps has fed into The Woodland Trust’s conservation work directly. They have enabled their teams to manage application processes to fulfil thousands of woodland creation and community planting projects, getting trees into the hands of many thousands of people, facilitating planting experiences and helping to inspire a deeper connection to nature.
