Sage ERP Accpac helps small importer grow their business

by Case Studies on 2010-09-17

Sage Accpac ERP | Success Story

---

---

Microscooters are a small import and distribution business of four staff, based in Wellington, New Zealand. They import the highly popular brand of Micro scooters and its accessories into the Australian and New Zealand market places.
Microscooters was founded in 1996 by Wim Ouboter in Switzerland. Today, the brand remains popular where millions of children across the globe have a micro scooter.

When Jeremy Brown started his business in New Zealand he used the MYOB accounting package with a stand-alone e-commerce website. They also used a 3rd party warehousing and distribution provider with the ability to communicate via EDI.

The Challenge
Jeremy comments, “As we grew, it became apparent that our systems and processes were becoming increasingly labour-intensive, and beginning to hinder our growth. On top of this, the lack of watertight integration between ourthree systems (website, accounting package and warehouse) was resulting in errors that were becoming difficult to stay on top of”.

Jeremy evaluated a number of systems looking for a comprehensive web-centric solution that would cater to their growing needs. He says, “a plethora of web developers wanted to integrate their opensource-based e-commerce websites with our existing accounting package, but we needed a comprehensive end-to-end solution that could handle our growth plans”.

The solution
What was needed was a feature rich accounting system that could cope with the expansion of the business, which would tightly integrate with theirwebsite and warehousing system, and could be easily customised. Business processes that they required to be automated included:

• Stock management
• Purchase Ordering
• Reporting and Analysis
• Back Office Administration, and
• Customer Relationship Management

Microscooters decided on an integrated solution built on XM’s e-commerce software and Sage Accpac ERP. After some customisations were made, the new system was implemented towards the end of 2009.

The result
“ The main benefit to us is Accpac’s clean integration with the XM e-commerce software. The solution is an integral part of our business now, with the bulk of our customers ordering online”. Customer orders passed directly into Accpac from the website, where they are checked and then passed on to the warehouse via EDI for dispatch.

The warehouse dispatches each order then sends Accpac notification via EDI of what has been shipped and an invoice is generated.Invoicing and shipping details including tracking information is displayed on the customer’s online account. “This clean integration end-to-end from Customer right through to the dispatch of the order and then back to the customer again means information is keyed only once, thereby reducing human effort, but more importantly reducing the margin for error”, concludes Jeremy.

“This clean integration end-toend from Customer right through to the dispatch of the order and then back to the customer again means information is keyed only once, thereby reducing human effort, but more importantly reducing the  margin for error”

Jeremy Brown,
Director, Microscooters

Sage Accpac
13 sage (13 7243)
Sage Business Solutions
Level 6, 67 Albert Ave,
Chatswood, NSW 2067
Telephone: +61 2 9921 6500
www.sagebusiness.com.au
www.sagebusiness.co.nz