Sage for bigger businesses

Vimto

Newton Le Willows, Merseyside

The problem

Vimto is part of the Nichols PLC group. The challenge for them was to coordinate all the aspects of their business from manufacturing to distribution, customers to employees and to keep all the different processes aligned.

"We were using Sage Line 500 throughout the group of companies to administer the backend processes. We’d also developed our own CRM system," Group IT manager Allan Doyle explains.

"So when Sage 1000 v2.3 came out with its integrated CRM, it seemed the perfect fit for us."

They needed a system that’s flexible enough to be able to allow them to change their processes and procedures. "Sage allows us to do this."

Sage's solution

Bringing all the functions together and integrating with existing software and processes means Nichols PLC now have one view of their business both across the UK and worldwide.

Allan explains the new solution is at the heart of their computer systems.

"We’ve since developed our own internal workflow systems such as expenses, holiday systems and purchase order requisition systems that all our users use for their processes and these are interfaced into Sage.

"It makes it very efficient, there’s no human intervention and it’s very accurate.

"Success for us was having a low maintenance efficient system and Sage 1000 has given us this."

The company continues to grow, with new products and new flavours expanding their range. As Allan explains, "The Sage 1000 system is going to have a lot more processing to do in the future. But I’m confident it’s more than up to the task."

Lloyds TSB

London

The problem

"We had all the classic problems, we struggled to really know what was going on," according to Charles Brown, Senior Consultant at Lloyds TSB Commercial Finance. "Salespeople couldn’t easily share information, and we couldn’t identify which market spaces were being addressed. We therefore instigated a project to look at implementing a companywide CRM solution."

Sage's solution

Having identified the main mid market players, Lloyds chose SalesLogix from Sage. "There were a number of key factors behind the decision," Charles explains. "Firstly SalesLogix is backed by Sage. It's important for us that any supplier we chose wasn't going to disappear overnight; we need someone with long term strength and stability. We also liked the way the product looked and found it easy to use. It wasn’t too complicated, unlike the competition."

Wates

Leatherhead, Surrey with 11 other offices in the UK

The problem

As with any business spread across different sites, retaining control of and sharing information is crucial to Wates. It helps them deliver projects on time and to budget. It’s also particularly important for them to keep control of their costs, whilst allowing project teams to manage subcontractors, suppliers and payments at site level.

Sage's solution

By dealing directly with subcontractors and suppliers, Wates' site managers can deal with issues on the spot, and use their local knowledge to drive a good deal. Chris Bowman, Group IT Director for Wates, says: "Sage Construction has allowed us to improve control over the business in total."

Read the full case study.

The Eden Project

St Austell, Cornwall

The problem

The Eden Project is an educational charity that operates the world famous visitor attraction housing plants from all over the globe. Their challenge was to manage all their employees, including full-time and seasonal staff as well as volunteer workers.

Sage's solution

The Eden Project’s People Development team uses software from Sage to manage all their people. Employees and line managers also use a self-service module to control all their own information. Leah says, “The Sage system helps us tremendously… with statistics and facts and figures and information that we wouldn’t have otherwise.”