POS Solution
Operating a specialty retail business where 1300 – 1400 items are available for sale to customers from all over the world is a challenge. They had already been using an old, simple program when Ralph began to realize they needed to more fully automate and integrate their business processes. They needed some way to speed up the time it took to perform several major functions of their business. There were three major business functions needing to be streamlined in order for Quillin to gain the efficiencies Ralph believed was possible.
Ralph Quillin started Quillin Leather and Tack in the early 1970’s. They’ve been manufacturing and selling custom made leather products ever since and have been at their present location on Main Street in Paris, Kentucky since 1982. Quillin is Kentucky’s largest custom leather shop. They produce and ship over 17,000 handmade halters a year. About 25% of their business is done over the Internet; 20% is walk-in retail business and the rest is traditional mail order. They carry a full line of accessories and complimentary products for horse and pet owners. Local newspapers or magazines always call Quillin Leather and Tack when they need an expert opinion about anything leather related. A quick look at their catalog immediately informs the reader of the high degree of professionalism, skill and craftsmanship that goes into the production of their halters.
With very few exceptions Quillin does pretty much every part of their business in house.
www.quillin.com
• They needed to find a way to reduce the time taken for each transaction done in the retail store and reduce the time it took to produce reports for those particular sales at the end of the day. • They needed to automate their sales process to getting all sales, no matter which channel they came through, to manufacturing and then of course, to shipping and accounting. • Quillin also wanted to automate their UPS shipping. They had looked into a solution from another vendor; tried to implement it but they could never get it to work.
Successful Solution
The KiBiz System, along with FileMaker Pro were installed over 6 years ago and customized to meet Quillin’s need for automation and integration. Quillin was a long time Mac and FileMaker user and wanted to build upon their experience with a FileMaker based business solution to continue to get the reliability, quality and ease of use that they were accustomed to.
“KiPoint”, the point-of-sale module handles Quillin’s walk-in retail business. The need for manually entering information on numerous forms has been eliminated. All data regarding an in-store transaction is entered into the system at the time of the sale and the inventory and accounting are automatically updated. And now, “at the end of the day it’s boom, boom we’ve got a report of the day’s transactions. We’re all set and ready to go. The big thing is it allows us to be more effective and more efficient in the cashing out process.”
To get sales information to manufacturing and shipping, Quillin used the Purchasing Module. Nearly everything Quillin sells is manufactured to order, when an order comes in, it’s invariably going to be for something they’re going to produce right there on site. They’ve always been just a bit too busy to build up much inventory on most of their items. They’ve set it up so that there are now six Quillin “vendors” – six departments, representing the six categories of items they produce. The system compiles and combines all the orders as they come in, removes stock of items ordered from current inventory, then generates and sends a purchase order for the correct number of items that need to be produced, to the appropriate department or Quillin “vendor”.
UPS Solution – Ki Systems staff worked closely with NRG Software to create the UPS Shipping Module to replace “World Ship” and facilitate the integration of Quillin’s shipping with UPS directly from KiBiz. The process is automated to the point where a shipping label is generated at the time the order is processed. It’s put in the box, with all other forms generated as the order is taken. The label arrives in the shipping department already on the carton.
Customer Benefits
Quillin has achieved a totally satisfactory result from the FileMaker Pro based KiBiz System solution. “The biggest thing with KiPoint” (the retail sales module) Ralph reports, “is it allows us to be more effective and more efficient in getting a customer taken care of, cashed out and our personnel able to move on to the next customer, instead of being bogged down manually processing each part of every purchase.” In utilizing the KiBiz Purchsing Module Quillin has gained efficiencies of scale by combining all orders instead of taking each individual order through the entire process as they did before. The UPS shipping module has saved time and eliminated errors. Previously, the shipping label was generated when an order got to the shipping department. That was a duplication of effort and time and it also presented an additional opportunity to make an error in creating the label. Quillin estimates this module has cut his shipping room time in half. “We’ve gained 10 – 15% in efficiency. We’re able to make more things and get more done in less time,” Ralph says.Case studies of businesses that have benefited from KiBiz
“We’ve gained 10 – 15% in efficiency. We’re able to make more things and get more done in less time. If anyone were to ask me if I think they should go with KiBiz, I’d tell them unequivocally,
this is who you need to go with.”
Ralph Quillin, Founder and Owner