Situation

Marble Crafters is the Philadelphia region's premier tile and stone company. The Marble Crafters team of expert installers is experienced in working with all types of natural stone and tile applications for flooring, wall cladding, tub surrounds, showers, fireplaces and countertops. The company has over 100 employees and operates from a new 50,000 square foot facility in Trainer, Pennsylvania.

Challenge

For years we had too much of the wrong materials and not enough of the right materials. We would incorrectly anticipate how much of each stone we should buy and as a result, inventory would sit for months or years before we could unload it and hope we could break even. On the other hand, in order to keep production moving we always seemed to have to scramble and overpay to get the correct material right away. These inventory problems cost us a fortune. Between losing money on material we had trouble selling and paying top dollar to quickly get what we needed, it's a wonder we made any money at all. In addition, doing physical inventories was a nightmare. We used to shut down production for a week or more to do the physical counts each year. It was costing us tens of thousands of dollars in lost production.

Solution

Summit Software provided us the tools to study and understand our sales and production processes and cycles. Now we make informed purchasing decisions as opposed to buying based on speculation. We also implemented a bar coding system that makes our day to day production much more efficient. In addition, the bar coding system and reduced inventory we stock makes doing the physical inventory much easier.

Results

Now that we have a handle on inventory, 95% of our material shortages have been eliminated. An extra bonus is even though the shortages have been eliminated we actually carry $750,000 less inventory then we used to because we now carry the right materials. The physical inventory is also an area where Summit Software has been a lifesaver. The whole process is now down to a couple of days. Using the bar coding system, not only do we count faster, it's more accurate. We don't even have to stop production. For these reasons and many more, I would recommend to anyone considering accounting and manufacturing systems to talk to Summit Software before buying.