success storiesRead how our clients meet their unique operational challenges and improve their performance with Sage BusinessWorks. | ||
OPI "Lets it Ssslllide" With Sage BusinessWorks
When OPI’s tagline says the company "lets it ssslllide," they don’t mean that they’re apathetic. OPI applies no-stick finishes to products for the aerospace, medical, potable water, food processing, and packaging industries.
The company has never wanted its business practices to slide, however, and early on adopted a DOS accounting system called PowerBase. "It was better than hand posting, but you had to know COBOL to use it, which meant keeping a programmer on staff," says Tim Kachelmeier. "It was not flexible enough, either. We experimented with several custom packages before we discovered Sage BusinessWorks Accounting as a client-server solution."
Powerful Efficiencies
OPI uses Sage BusinessWorks to automate almost every aspect of its business. The system manages estimates, quotations, receivables, payables, general ledger, laser check printing, work order, inventory, and sales functions. Sage BusinessWorks also makes it easy to prepare balance sheets, closing statements, and other financial documents.
"A good example of the power of Sage BusinessWorks comes from our Accounts Receivable module," says Kachelmeier. "The software tracks all credit card payments and debits, as well as data on customers, and this information is integrated with the rest of the system.We also use the software to store photos of the products we coat, so we can access them quickly when customers place an order."
He praises the streamlined design of the software. "Sage BusinessWorks offers great reporting and posting features, with only a very light load on the network. That’s because it is such an efficient and pragmatic product. If you need to make a connection between data at point A and point B, it will find the quickest and easiest way to do it."
Secure, Accessible, User-Friendly
Sage BusinessWorks proved to be easy to learn. "It's like using an ATM," Kachelmeier comments. "After you've figured it out once, you're good to go. Our people can get in and out of the system quickly, and they appreciate being able to check their own payroll information without going to human resources. At the same time, Sage BusinessWorks includes great security features, so we can control who has access to data."
OPI's business partner has played a big role in the solution's success. "Sage BusinessWorks is pretty intuitive," explains Kachelmeier. "But when we've needed to extend our use of it, our reseller has given us what we need. They designed an order acknowledgements form that our customers like a lot, as well as a custom report we use every day during production meetings to track work in progress."
Sticking With a Winner
With remote access to Sage BusinessWorks, Kachelmeier can enter the system from any Internet connection. "It's wonderful to be able to work from the satellite office or at home, and see data exactly as if I were at my own desk," he says. "The pull-down menus, the headers-everything is identical. This makes it much simpler for me to keep my finger on the pulse of the company, no matter what else is going on."
The software continues to prove its worth for OPI. "Just the Sales Order Report in Sage BusinessWorks saves us several hundred dollars a day, and eliminates the embarrassment of misplacing sales orders," Kachelmeier says. "The system is making us 20 percent more efficient, and that's a conservative figure. In fact, if we didn't have Sage BusinessWorks, we'd have to hire three full-time employees plus a backup. All of these savings translate into better quality operations, as we can reallocate money to more strategic areas."
After eight years on Sage BusinessWorks software, Kachelmeier is a very satisfied customer. "The Sage BusinessWorks product line has withstood the test of time for us, delivering a great balance between value and quality," he says. "And Sage BusinessWorks upgrades continue to provide new features that help us to be even more effective."
