Macfarlane Packaging Case Study

Transcription

1 Macfarlane Packaging Case Study

2 The Project In November 2010, the international ecommerce specialist Crimsonwing completed the new basketbased ecommerce solution for Macfarlane Packaging Ltd. The Crimsonwing ebusiness team has replaced Macfarlane Packaging s previous online ecommerce store, which was a custom built and maintained solution, with the new Magento Enterprise Edition. The Magento solution provides new features, enhanced user experience and seamless integration with Macfarlane s other systems. The new Magento Enterprise platform cares for Macfarlane s business needs with a function-rich solution and allows them to react faster to their customers needs, a key driver for Macfarlane s platform choice. Client Information Macfarlane Packaging Ltd, part of the Macfarlane Group, is the leading UK distributor of packaging, providing the most comprehensive range of packaging products of any UK based supplier. Macfarlane Group is listed on the UK Stock Exchange and services the UK and European market places. The company provides a full packaging solution to their customers including consulting on client needs, right through to design, producing and distributing packaging and labels to customers across a wide range of industry sectors, Background & Requirements Prior to the rollout of the Magento Enterprise Edition, Macfarlane had a successful, but very static, basketbased ecommerce website, via which end-consumers could process orders. The system was built as a custom application by Macfarlane, in order to establish an online presence for the first time. This website targeted the end-consumer, as well as servicing a proportion of Macfarlane s B2B customers. Following the initial establishment of their online presence, Macfarlane wished to rapidly increase the functionality offered to their customers online, refresh the design and be in a position to react much faster to their customers needs. Macfarlane undertook an exercise to find best-ofbreed software and concluded that Magento suited the aspirational objectives of the Macfarlane ecommerce strategy. The enhanced merchandising, customer segmentation and multi-site capabilities, which the Magento Enterprise Edition provides, made Magento a compelling choice for Macfarlane, providing ample tools for increasing their online sales. The Macfarlane Packaging Director of ecommerce, Mark Selby, was integral to the design and delivery of this solution, having day to day input both into the requirements, but also the build and test of the solution. He explained that "Coming from a custom built static site, we were eager to partner with a flexible and progressive solution. Having benchmarked a number of products and service providers, we were excited to introduce and integrate both Crimsonwing and Magento Enterprise as our strategic solution for our ebusiness going forward. Finding a partner became a greater challenge; to find a differentiator between one supplier and another.

3 On this basis Macfarlane interviewed each supplier to understand the following: Previous experience with the software and implementation Previous experience with like-minded organisations to Macfarlane The company profile and objectives/aspirations The people. We found comfort with the messages and responses from Crimsonwing and liked the company. People buy from people! Mark Selby also explained that it was refreshing that the Crimsonwing team was not afraid to admit areas that needed further investigation, or identify issues where it might be beneficial to work with a specialist partner. How many Sales people promise everything and deliver below expectations? With Crimsonwing, we had an immediate insight into strengths and weaknesses and knew where we would have to strengthen areas of the projects internally. customer requirements were identified: able to buy online, researching new products, having immediate access to price information, news and company information. Macfarlane had out-grown its current platform and had key objectives to deliver against these customer demands. This required either significant development on their existing infrastructure or investing in a best-of-breed ecommerce product that delivered 80% of their requirements straight out of the box. Macfarlane needed a solutions provider that could not only implement and customise Magento as they required, but also a reliable partner to integrate the system with their other back-end platforms. Crimsonwing had to carefully consider the integration of Magento Enterprise solution to a number of custom built systems at Macfarlane, in order to achieve their overall solution and objectives. These integrations include real-time integration to the Macfarlane ERP system (ASW) for accurate order and fulfilment management, and to a custom built CRM, for customer information, such as addresses and pricing data. The Solution Macfarlane view their Magento implementation as a strategic decision and a general direction for their overall business. The functionality provided by Magento Enterprise and the data enrichment and business process re-engineering that needed to be carried out by Macfarlane to support this strategic move, can now be used across their business. We really enjoyed the open source strategy. The fact that a community of users and developers of similar expectations were delivering solutions that could easily be adopted by other members was inspirational, said Mark Selby. Macfarlane s main objective was to increase their online presence, which was developed on the basis of communication with their customers. The following

4 The Magento platform offers Macfarlane the opportunity not just to increase their merchandising and thus sales online, but offline as well. With this in mind, Crimsonwing carried out a series of workshops to ascertain Macfarlane s overall business goals, so that the design of Macfarlane s platform can support the business for many years to come. The initial release of the Macfarlane Packaging web store is the first phase within Macfarlane s overall business strategy for online. Further improvements will follow over the coming months, including increased up-sells, enhanced usability for CSR s and increased functionality between ASW (Macfarlane s back-end system) and Magento. Besides all the general features that the Macfarlane site uses extensively, Crimsonwing provided a number of functional enhancements to Macfarlane. The new solution offers a fresh design and enhanced Web 2.0 features, such as layered navigation, single page checkout and rich customer facing functionality. Using Magento Enterprise Edition enables Macfarlane to react faster to their customers and market s needs due to its constant updates and new features. Mark Selby explained that what we had to understand was this was not a new coat of paint, this was a new build and we didn t even have an architect s plan! Planning was everything. Fortunately, all participants in the project were Prince II trained and were aware of the methodologies of such an implementation 90% planning 10% implementation. The solution includes a tightly coupled integration to Macfarlane s line of business systems, and has been designed to support both the end-consumer and dedicated account customers that Macfarlane services. The solution includes customer specific pricing, realtime order injection, and advanced customer service via live chat and call back functions. As with all projects, requirements and expectations change. What seemed good ideas in the beginning were replaced with great ideas during development. What was good about Crimsonwing was their ability to manage change whilst maintaining a clear definition of the end goal said Macfarlane s ecommerce Director, Mark Selby. After the implementation of phase one, Mark Selby reflected: As with all implementations, go-live was lively! And we have continued to enhance and enrich the website. When people say great website, bet you re glad that s over how wrong they are! The work started the moment we activated the new website and from that moment, we now operate a continuous improvement program to ensure the user experience is the best we can give. Our customers also helped in the process by feeding back opinions of designs and features they liked and disliked, which helped during our design and wire-framing process. This illustrates how important it is to have a two-way relationship with your customers.

5 Business Benefits David Simonds, Crimsonwing s Project Manager, said: By using a combination of Magento Enterprise Edition and Crimsonwing, Macfarlane gains access to an extremely cost-effective business solution. Magento Enterprise and its partner network offer a vast array of standard functionality, meaning Macfarlane can react quickly to their customers needs. Crimsonwing, with over 10 years of ebusiness experience, provide a wealth of expertise in ecommerce solutions, specialising in projects requiring complex integrations. The new Magento based Macfarlane store will offer an extremely flexible online solution to Macfarlane for years to come. Specific benefits that the new Magento Enterprise site brought about are enhanced usability, particularly in navigation within the site with an improved taxonomy supporting layered navigation, so that customers can find their products faster. The site offers a refreshed look and feel, supporting the strong Macfarlane brand, together with increased merchandising and up-selling opportunities throughout the whole site. The web shop supports a single page checkout, cutting down the order processing time for customers, and enhancing the customer shopping experience. The site also offers enhanced promotions and content management capabilities to Macfarlane, handing day to day control of website management from IT staff to Macfarlane s business users, as well as encouraging customer loyalty. The site has also streamlined business processes for Macfarlane and their customers, with online applications for business credit, which are now being handled online for example. About Macfarlane Macfarlane Packaging Ltd, part of the Macfarlane Group, is the leading UK distributor of packaging consumable products with a market share of approximately 20%. The company operates through 17 Regional Distribution Centres supplying customers on a local, regional and national basis. In addition, Macfarlane Packaging has two manufacturing sites concerned with the design and manufacture of bespoke packaging solutions. About Magento Magento is a feature-rich, professional open-source ecommerce solution that offers merchants complete flexibility and control over the look, content, and functionality of their online store. Magento s intuitive administration interface contains powerful marketing, search engine optimisation and catalogue management tools to give merchants the power to create sites that are tailored to their unique business needs. Designed to be completely scalable and backed by an extensive support network, Magento offers companies the ultimate ecommerce solution.