Press operator at KDV Label
For nearly 15 years, KDV Label – based in Waukesha, Wisconsin in the United States – used a custom built enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. But, as the market grew and KDV expanded its diverse product portfolio, the pieced-together ERP system’s limitations had a growing, negative impact.
KDV recognised the negative impact its aging custom system was having on its ability to stay lean, informed and responsive. ‘We were experiencing increased duplicate entry of information and had an increasing reliance on external programs to fill in the holes left by our aging ERP system,’ said Steve McBride, IT manager and customer service representative at KDV Label. With segmented data and little integration available to promote the flow of information, data management was becoming a burden on the company.
‘With our old system, we were fixing it and working on things pretty much every day. We relied heavily on one person and when that person was no longer with the company, there was a big drop off in information,’ said Mr McBride. Data that was available was static and day old when everything was working properly, which greatly impaired the company’s ability to manage proactively and respond to changes on the fly. ‘The system updated itself at night and wasn’t ready until about 7am the next day,’ said Mr McBride, ‘so we had to wait a full day before seeing what had happened the day before.’
At that point, management’s decision making was based heavily on feel and with limited information, dealing with rush orders and last minute requests was becoming an increasing struggle. ‘We realised that we needed to find a new solution that was going to last and keep us going for years to come,’ said Mr McBride.
During a thorough comparison of a number of ERP systems, KDV found the best fit with EFI, which offers the Enterprise Packaging Productivity Suite with Radius software as its core ERP technology. ‘The system really fit the different users’ needs based on their job responsibilities,’ Mr McBride said. ‘We saw that they would be able to continue doing what they needed to do.’
The software’s industry fit also played a major role in the company’s confidence in moving forward with the system. Mr McBride said, ‘Other ERP vendors really seemed to be lacking people who understood our industry. Radius knew all our industry terms, which were deeply incorporated into the ERP system. The Radius consultants clearly understood what we were trying to do as a printing company.’ As KDV moved into the implementation, it worked closely with the Radius professionals, who explained what should be expected during the process and presented a detailed plan for transitioning to the Radius system.
‘They really knew where everything needed to be when we went live. The process was very streamlined,’ said Mr McBride. Company officials took their time with the project in order to get everything exactly how they wanted it and as soon as they went live on EFI Radius, they hit the ground running. ‘When we hit the go live, it was very smooth,’ said Mr McBride. ‘We had two consultants on site for the go live and they ended up leaving early that day because everything worked out so well.’
Using EFI workflow, KDV Label has seen a refreshing number of benefits, realising many of their expectations. ‘The system basically runs itself,’ said Mr McBride. ‘We are no longer spending a lot of time working on the software, like we were with our previous system.’ Along with this hands off maintenance, one of the biggest business benefits has been in the area of available, real time information. ‘With Radius, we can actually see what is going on as it is happening,’ Mr McBride explained. ‘Our customer service representatives have a lot more visibility into what is going on in the shop with specific jobs and items.’
KDV’s workflow software suite also allowed for extended visibility to its customers with the 24/7 customer portal, which allows them internet access to view information about their orders. ‘The portal has definitely enhanced our level of customer service and at the same time, has opened up more time internally to focus on other areas,’ Mr McBride said. It also has allowed the company to become a leaner organisation. The system has removed the tedious, error prone duplicated entry of information, which has greatly streamlined front office operations. ‘Now, we enter data once, and this has been crucial to our ability to keep our costs low,’ said Mr McBride. ‘Over the last ten years, we have doubled our business but haven’t come anywhere close to doubling the number of people we need to keep up with that growth.’
The availability of shared information has also allowed the company to become highly flexible when it comes to accommodating customer expectations and rush orders.
‘It is inevitable to have last minute changes to orders, or to have a customer tell us they need something urgently. Since information is so readily available, we can easily see what we have in inventory and if needed, quickly understand the affects changes will have on other scheduled jobs,’ Mr McBride explained. ‘We can shift jobs around and still know that we are working with an optimised schedule.’ Because of the Business Intelligence (BI) component in KDV’s workflow suite, company managers have been able to take a more proactive approach to decision making. ‘BI is showing us exactly where we need to improve. It is letting us look ahead to better understand our business and how we can address issues before problems arise.’
