Success Stories

Activant Acclaim and Trading Partner Connect Help Manufacturer Refine Business

Founded in 1962 and now in its third generation of Cook family leadership, Superior Abrasives manufactures high quality coated and non-woven abrasives for the metalworking industry. With 50 employees in a 50,000 square foot facility in Dayton, OH, Superior Abrasives remains a leader in its industry by expanding product lines, working with our distributors, and staying with leading-edge technologies.

When Superior Abrasives discovered their previous enterprise software solution was not Y2K-compliant, they had to decide whether to stay with their current system or move to another manufacturing or distribution package. To help them decide, they chose to focus on customer service. Visits to two Activant customers ultimately sold them on the robust enterprise software solution: Activant Acclaim. "Activant has a great customer service-oriented solution, and we were certain that they would work with us to modify our solution to meet our manufacturing needs," explains Lynne Henson, controller of Superior Abrasives.

Streamlined Processes

According to Henson, Superior Abrasives benefits most from Acclaim's easy access to customer information, a feature that improves customer service and reduces the amount of time that customer service representatives (CSRs) spend on the phone. "I believe that our sales and customer service group spend 95 percent of their time in the pricing and availability screen," says Henson. Since customers want to place an order and get off the phone quickly, their CSRs depend on Acclaim's ability to drill down from the pricing and availability screen to find pertinent information required to process orders. "Without Acclaim, we would have to expand our customer service team as our sales grow. But with Acclaim, we know that we can take on 15-20 percent more sales without needing additional customer service staff," says Henson.

Henson realizes the same value in accounting and purchasing. She notices that the cash receipts end of accounting is so simplified that Superior Abrasives can go through numerous checks in a very short time period. And, invoicing is an automated process. "We've gotten by with very few people in each department. If my accounting or purchasing staff is out and I need to take over, the system is so simple that I don't need to refer to a manual or a vendor's catalog to complete the job. All the necessary information is already in the system...not in an employee's head," Henson explains.

Henson also realizes that too much inventory is detrimental to Superior Abrasives' bottom line. "We rely heavily on Activant's inventory management system to keep just the right amount of stock on the shelf at all times for customer demand. We set purchase classes, lead times, and safety stocks. And, we also had a consultant spend a half day with us helping tweak the system using Activant's inventory management UPTO methodology," describes Henson.

Helping them improve customer service, reduce operational expenses, and increase their bottom line, Activant customized Superior Abrasives' secondary processing module. Through customization, they are now able to tag their finished product with raw items, components, and processes needed to complete an item. Inventory is adjusted accordingly when raw items are allocated to the job ticket. Superior Abrasives can now tell where a product is in the production process by drilling down into the secondary processing ticket. "We used to have to search throughout the plant for tickets. Now we look into our Acclaim solution to know that a job ticket was produced, where the product is in the plant, and a good estimate of how long it will take to finish the product," Henson replies.

Improved Customer Service

Since Superior Abrasives wants to make it as easy as possible for their customers to do business with them, they joined Activant Trading Partner Connect. Henson recommends it to any company that wants to save time and money. "Your customer service representatives will save time looking for stock pricing and availability via the network, rather than calling the manufacturer to satisfy customer requests," advises Henson. "We hope to continue setting-up new distributor partners on Trading Partner Connect. Since January 14th, when we began using Trading Partner Connect, we currently have eleven distributors actively trading with us."

According to Henson, Superior Abrasives will partner with Activant well into the future for two simple reasons - "cutting-edge technologies and turnkey solutions."

For more information on Activant's enterprise software solutions, please fill out our Web Contact Form.

Back to Top

For more information on Activant's enterprise software solutions, please fill out our Web Contact Form.

Back to Top