"Case Study: Holland Bulb Farms—Online Flower Provider Manages Web Store to Support Company Growth"

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"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."
Source : Everest Software Inc.

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Case Study: Holland Bulb Farms—Online Flower Provider Manages Web Store to Support Company Growth

Company Background

Located in Menomonee Falls, WI., Holland Bulb Farms (www.hollandbulbfarms.com) specializes in the online sale of lower bulbs, perennials, indoor growing gift items and garden tools.

Originally an importer and distributor of lower bulbs and perennials from Holland, Holland Bulb Farms was primarily doing business with parks, landscapers, garden stores and loral shops. Management noticed a niche in this industry, when many customers began looking for speciic and unique varieties of plants and lowers at unbeatable prices. Moving into this niche market has caused Holland Bulb Farms to become the thriving company they are today.

The Challenge

With over 25,000 customers relying on Holland Bulb Farms for their gardening needs, it became critical that Holland Bulb Farms igure out a more eficient way to sell and market their items on the web.

With their rapidly growing business, it was also critical that they had an integrated system that would allow them to keep track of their growing number of transactions, expenses and purchases.

Previously using Microsoft Excel to track all aspects of their business from accounting to inventory, Holland Bulb Farms knew they must ind a new software system that could easily import information from Excel.

Holland Bulb Farms runs on Everest Software.

Key Functionality Used:

• Real-time Intergration with Back End Accounting and Business Operations
• Taking Orders Online
• Real-Time Order Status
• Accounting General Ledger
• Accounts Receivable
• Accounts Payable
• Sales Quotes and Orders
• Inventory Control
• Purchasing
• Direct TCP/IP Remote Login

The Solution

When looking into all-in-one integrated solutions, Holland Bulb Farms' key criteria included e-commerce integration, return on investment and the ability for a program to, once implemented, run itself.

Holland Bulb Farms looked into a variety of software solutions including QuickBooks and various hosted solutions.

The one solution that stood out was Everest Software's cost-effective, all-in-one Everest Advanced. The fully integrated solution includes accounting, inventory control, sales,order entry, purchasing, e-commerce, shipping and receiving, and more, allowing Holland Bulb Farms to manage and track business operations online and ofline, from the front to back ofice.

"Everest was the all-in-one solution for us. Everything is integrated, the e-commerce site, automated sales orders, payment processing, accounting, reporting, real-time dashboard, plus so much more," said Erik Thomas, Director of E-Commerce for Holland Bulb Farms.

From implementation to day to day activities, the company transitioned seamlessly to the Everest system. "Everest was very simple to launch, there was not a need to have a full time product manager, web designer or web programmer for getting the new company off the ground, this was all handled by Everest (the application) itself. Everest provided knowledgeable account representatives that assisted in the planning and implementation of Everest Advanced. This allowed our core team to continue focusing on the Company's current goals without having to dedicate any staff or hours for implementation, said Thomas.

With the help of Everest, it was easy to train the entire company to use the system.

Some of the most important beneits of using Everest for Holland Bulb Farms were the integrated e-commerce features as well as the lexibility to fully customize templates. This has allowed Holland Bulb Farms to keep their website fresh and up-to-date with industry trends. Most recently, Holland Bulb Farms has launched a second website (www.TulipWorld.com) through Everest e-commerce, all controlled from one central database.

Everest has also greatly reduced the issues Holland Bulb Farms previously had with their ordering process. Checking the status of their orders has now become a seamless process. Holland Bulb Farms is now able to track their ordering process so that their employees can see when their order will be shipped as well as all of the tracking numbers associated with the order. Everest's integration with UPS WorldShip has been very beneicial to Holland Bulb Farms. This integration has cut their warehouse labor in half and has greatly reduced the amount of invalid shipments by importing customer data directly into UPS WorldShip.

Results

300% Return on Investment (ROI) within the first month of the e-commerce site going live, without the use of any marketing materials or email messages.

Enabled Holland Bulb Farms to have a seamless implementation process, allowing staff to focus on their business and not dedicate any staff or hours to development or implementation.

Supported the rapid growth of the company by enabling complete integration across inventory, accounting, purchasing, sales, order tracking and e-commerce.

Holland Bulb Farms is now able to keep their website innovative and up to date with industry trends, thanks to the plethora of features that Everest includes in their webstore.

About Everest Software, Inc.

Everest Software's fully integrated business management software solution, Everest Advanced, addresses the unique needs of growing small and medium businesses in the wholesale/distribution, retail and e-tail industries by allowing them to quickly manage and track their business operations online and ofline. Everest Software is the proud winner of numerous awards including the SIIA Codie Award for 'Best Business Software Product.