Join the thousands who run their entire business on Everest
Whether your business is retail, wholesale, distribution, mail order, or e-commerce, Everest is the only management solution you need to run, improve, and grow your business.
With ten years of business expertise
in office furniture solutions, Abel
Zalcberg set up OFM, Inc. in 1995. Specialized
in office seating, OFM has a manufacturing
facility in Taiwan, a distribution location
in California, and a wholesale unit
in North Carolina. Selling to retailers,
e-retailers and mail order companies
across USA, OFM strives to exceed its
2,600 customers' expectations by providing
top quality office furniture goods and
service. OFM is committed to provide
good service, good quality, fast and
safe delivery. OFM runs on Everest Software.
The
Challenge
With QuickBooks no longer
able to meet his business requirements,
Zalcberg, OFM’s owner and vice
president, recognized the need for reliable
software that would increase the integrity
and accountability of the company’s
accounting practices. “QuickBooks
is just not an acceptable accounting
package for us at this stage in our
company’s growth – it’s
too easy for someone to use questionable
practices in QuickBooks without any
way to trace it. For instance, after
an invoice had been made and payment
received from the customer, anyone could
actually delete it and no one could
trace the change. We could not operate
under such conditions. There were no
checks-and-balances in the system.”
In addition, it would take three full
days a week to run reports – an
exercise that works out to$93,000 per
year in manpower costs.
Zalcberg started to assess different
accounting software, seeking more integrity
and greater efficiency; he evaluated
Solomon and others, but none provided
the ability to track changes and prevent
duplication of orders. To overcome these
operational issues, Zalcberg chose Everest
Standard Edition.
The
Solution
OFM keeps a separate tally of inventory
for the warehouse location; Everest helped
Zalcberg integrate the accounting and inventory
control for the warehouse, and the managing
of bin locations. They have a better handle
on inventory control without having to oversupply
or overstock,and are able to improve their
operating costs with real-time inventory control,
“when our suppliers call, we are able
to tell them exactly what we need.”
Now, with the help of Everest, it takes 80% less time to run OFM’s weekly reports, saving 24 man-hours a week and saving the company about $87,000 per year. “Everest gives us real-time inventory and real-time reports, which are very timely and very informative.”
Everest has not only made their business more
efficient, it has nearly doubled Zalcberg’s
productivity, too; he spends more time focusing
on the big picture and not getting bogged
down with the details of day-to-day business.
At OFM, Everest makes life easier for all
employees. “We believe in the reliability
of Everest,” said Zalcberg. “We
are definitely running more smoothly and more
efficiently. It takes a lot less time to run
reports, less time to do payroll, and less
time to do inventory than ever before.”
Everest creates a customer’s original
sales quote faster and saves even more time
converting sales orders into invoices.
With regard to business management, Everest
has enabled OFM to handle double the volume
with just one person added to the organization.
According to Zalcberg, the same number of
people without Everest would not have been
able to handle the growth. Now they are able
to keep their inventory at a minimum, without
overheads growing as rapidly as their sales
volume.
At a 25% annual growth rate, OFM’s sales
have doubled while simultaneously increasing
in efficiency. OFM has become 50% more efficient
in the warehouse. Technically, it would have
required four people to manage inventory.
Now, with Everest in place and twice the volume,
it takes only three. What also made a difference
was being able to separately identify bin
locations and not have to run around in a
30,000 sq. ft. building trying to manually
search for items.
OFM, Inc. imports products, which implies
long lead-times. Zalcberg found the opportunity
in Everest to initiate just-in-time inventory.
That was accomplished with the Excellize functionality
in Everest that enables data integration with
MS Excel spreadsheets, effectively allowing
them to pull information from the database.
It also works as a predictive analysis tool,
allowing them to accurately estimate what
they would need to order ten weeks ahead.
“People in the distribution business
are importing a lot these days, and when you’re
importing it’s usually a long lead-time.
Everest almost creates a little crystal ball
for me, which allows me to see into the future,”
explains Zalcberg.
The
Result
537% year 1 return on investment,
with a ten-week payback period
50% increase in efficiency and the
ability to handle twice the volumein
the warehouse while
reducing administrative overheads
Improved operating performance
analysis and decision-making abilities
through Everest’s
real-time, daily reports
Saved 24 man-hours per week, and $87,000
per year on running reports
Reduced inventory levels by 12% due
to Everest’s real-time inventory
tracking capabilities
Facilitates better and faster customer
service through real-time customer account
access
