Boxes R Us, a provider of gift and promotional packaging solutions for small businesses, has been showing an outstanding leap in efficiency and operational excellence since adopting Fishbowl Advanced.
Using Fishbowl’s effective automation tools to help remedy the ills of manual processing can serve as a beacon of inspiration for emerging businesses within the manufacturing sector that are looking to boost productivity and efficiency across the board.
Business Challenge
According to industry experts, the absence of a robust inventory management system can pose serious challenges for developing businesses, leading to financial losses and operational setbacks.
Amidst a multitude of outdated practices handed down from the previous owner of Boxes R Us, one particularly outdated process involved the manual recording of stocktakes on a whiteboard within the factory.
Boxes R Us provides gift and promotional packaging for small businesses, and they’re happy to provide small quantities. You don’t have to be a massive company to purchase from them, nor do you have to buy a thousand boxes. That’s how they remain competitive, but because of that, they often found themselves holding a lot of different stock, which can be challenging.
The combination of holding different types of stock and in reasonably large quantities and then managing stock levels manually posed significant risks for Boxes R Us. They were potentially holding too much stock, not maximizing their cash flow and not running efficiently as a business.
The Solution
Implementing an effective inventory management solution to achieve visibility, greater efficiency, and time & cost savings
An inventory management software like Fishbowl can assist significantly with inventory prediction accuracy.
By examining trends from high-performing products, inventory management systems can assist businesses with enhancing demand predictions.
It reduces storing and handling expenses, increases sales, and can improve cash flow. Records from the past (including peak seasons) may also be used to determine significant sales trends that need stock modifications throughout the year.
When Kristy & Scott Buckley took the reins of Boxes R Us, they quickly recognized the importance of modernizing their inventory processes. Acknowledging the critical need for streamlined operations and heightened accuracy, they decisively shifted away from outdated, manual methods to embrace the innovative capabilities offered by Fishbowl Advanced.
Mr. Buckley emphasized the simplicity of their choice, stating, “We undertook a comprehensive search, but implementing Fishbowl was an easy choice for us. The software did all of the things we needed it to do, and the service was exceptional right from the very beginning.” Mrs. Buckley echoed the sentiment, noting, “Fishbowl has undoubtably made our daily life incredibly easier. A thousand-fold. From the day that we launched with Fishbowl, our life has been easier. Even with the little mix-ups and learning the program and all that stuff, that was all easier than the way we ran prior to it.”
Results
Operational clarity, removing silos, and staff cohesiveness
“By using Fishbowl, it has saved us a lot of downtime and has basically paid for itself in the first 12 months, as with keeping everything streamlined and making things a whole lot more efficient,” Mr. Buckley emphasized, highlighting the tangible benefits reaped from their successful integration with Fishbowl.
The transformative journey continued as Mr. Buckley said, “We started using Fishbowl and doing complete stock takes and entering everything into the system and then started seeing how much stock we had sitting on the shelf. We had like $100,000 worth that wasn’t even moving. Now with Fishbowl we avoid this costly kind of mistake!”
Fishbowl’s seamless integration with accounting solutions like Xero and QuickBooks provided Boxes R Us with a comprehensive view of their inventory levels, purchase orders, and sales activities. This enhanced visibility empowered the business to make informed decisions, optimize cash flow, and drive sustainable growth.
Mrs. Buckley shared the impact on her daily routine, stating, “Before Fishbowl, I had to constantly leave my desk, keep someone on hold on the phone, and physically go to the factory to check our stock levels. Now I can access all the information I need with the click of a button. It obviously saves me a huge amount of time and effort.”
“Fishbowl has saved us approximately $60,000 in just inventory alone.” – Kristy Buckley
The success of Boxes R Us’s transformative journey stands as a testament to their leveraging of an advanced inventory management solution. By embracing the power of technology, Boxes R Us has achieved operational efficiencies which have enabled them to continue delivering great customer service and tailored solutions for small and medium businesses.
