The software system issue confronting East End Sawmills Ltd in Glasgow in late 2002 has undoubtedly faced other timber traders who computerised early on. Because of the uniquely varied nature of the timber trade, many companies like East End – which supplies softwood, hardwood, sheet materials and a range of other products from doors and specialist mouldings, to ironmongery – initially went bespoke.
Managing director Stewart Frew said that East End’s system eas-ily paid for itself in the 15 years since it was tailor-made. But, as a one-off, it had become increasingly onerous to support and update.
Mr Frew’s prime condition for a replacement system was that the software house behind it had previous timber industry experience. And as luck would have it, shortly before he had read a TTJ article about one of East End’s suppliers, Timbmet, using a system from the North American market leader, Canadian-based Progressive Solutions.
Progressive Solutions has a UK subsidiary and offers a UK-designed product called bisTrack. Aimed at building industry suppliers, this has special functionality for timber merchants and uses Microsoft Windows, giving “more flexibility than character-based systems”.
When the software was first demonstrated to East End, Progressive’s Alan Hamilton admits that it did not have all the functionality the merchant wanted. But Mr Frew appreciated the system was well-structured and came up with ideas for tweaks himself!
“He had many good suggestions to improve the functionality, based on his experiences with their previous software,” said Mr Hamilton.
Improved productivity
Now its bisTrack system is live, East End says staff are more productive and communication has improved. Simple collected and delivered orders are handled via four point-of-sale terminals handling cash and credit sales. Where orders are more complex, bisTrack co-ordinates everything. When a sales order is entered that needs machining, a works order is generated from it. If material is bought in, a purchase order is raised from the works order. All documents are linked, from quotations to final invoice, and timber tallies and descriptions of added-value operations are copied over as necessary. bisTrack also raises sub-contractor paperwork for operations like timber treatment.
The system can keep stock availability for each length of softwood and wastage from cutting longer lengths can be reduced, as staff discuss what is available with customers at order entry. Another bisTrack benefit, says East End, is that it interfaces with its Sage financial system, so there was no need for accounts department retraining.
Mr Frew is clearly happy to have left his less flexible bespoke system behind him and looks forward to bisTrack evolving with East End.
“Although bisTrack didn’t have all the functionality we wanted when we evaluated it shortly after its release, we could see that it was going to improve our profitability and efficiency greatly. We now have modern software which would fit almost any timber merchant.”
