Shane Mallon, Manager at Dronsfields Ltd shares their experience of picking Hollander International’s Pinnacle Professional system to power their yard management.
What made you choose Pinnacle Professional for your yard management system (YMS)?
“Changing a yard management system is a big decision, it sits right at the heart of our operation and the feeling was that the decision could make or break us. I can’t pretend the decision was simple, it was for us a high stakes decision. The options for us were to stick with what we knew, upgrade or take a leap to another provider.
When looking at the different YMS I had an eye on the next 5 to 10 years and wanted a system that could help us grow and also grow with us. In my opinion Pinnacle fits this requirement.
What sold me? Another ATF owner said that if they hadn’t moved to Pinnacle they don’t believe they would have been able to grow to the extent they have. To me that’s a serious statement to make by a business owner.
From the first presentation it was clear they were well prepared and knew what they were doing. I see it as more than a simple YMS, it’s a genuine business tool allowing the monitoring of every part of the business. Everyone I spoke to about pinnacle mentioned the reporting capabilities, I was told I can run a report for just about anything. We are very data driven so I knew the reports would help in our decision making and it has. We went with Pinnacle based on the whole package.”
What was the process of getting Pinnacle Professional integrated into how you work?
“Once we had made the decision to use Pinnacle we decided we would find out how it was designed to operate and we would then change our procedures to match Pinnacle. I think that may not be the case with a lot of ATF and I sensed some surprise from pinnacle, we approached the change completely open minded.
Paul Cunningham and Ben Craig came to visit me on site, I ran through how we do things and why, they then explained what pinnacle can do and how. This was well in advance of the transition giving me plenty of time to prepare and brief everyone on any changes that would affect them. The transition of our working methods went very well. We have gained big time savings for our yard staff using the work order manager.”
How did Hollander support your transition?
“As you can imagine with a change as substantial as this there was nerves abound. I did, however, have one advantage, I had sent five key members of staff (including myself) up to Hollander’s office in Edinburgh for two days of training. This proved invaluable during the transition as these people were able to help their colleagues.
The team that came to site to make the transition were professional, courteous and put everyone at ease. They made sure all our computers were set up at the beginning of the week and then went through a well organised specific role training in small groups. Every member of the team had received training before the go live day. The conversion was carried out overnight and when we arrived on site the next day we were fully operational on Pinnacle. The Hollander team stayed the rest of the week working with our team ensuring everyone felt comfortable.
Of course, after the Hollander team left the site we still had questions and came across situations that needed clarification. This is when Pinnacle excelled themselves again. The support team very quickly addressed the situation with various forms of remote support. At no point did we ever feel we were on our own.
I don’t think the transition could have gone any better.”
What key areas of Pinnacle have delivered a real benefit to your business?
“Pinnacle has really helped streamlining many areas of administrative unprofitable work, in fact the system was so efficient that within the first month of running on pinnacle I was able to make staff reductions in a cost centre. The lads in the stores spend less time in the office letting the sales team know of any problems or liaising with dispatch, this is all taken care of with the work order manager. As a manager I am able to see on one screen every order in real time as it is generated, picked and packed, booked on a courier and dispatched.
The way we inventory vehicles in pinnacle has helped in two ways, firstly, it has stopped the part being sold twice, this stops us letting customers down and stops the embarrassing call to the customer to explain we do not have what we thought we did.
The second benefit is with our visibility of parts that are still on vehicles. This benefit can’t be understated, it has without doubt led to extra sales. The visibility of the parts and the way we are inventorying is also allowing the sales team to be more accurate and our returns have dropped for all salesmen – clearly no coincidence.
A benefit that we did not even appreciate we would receive is the inter-trading with other Pinnacle users. This has helped increase sales to other Pinnacle users and by selling other Pinnacle users stock we are able to satisfy customers requirements we otherwise may not have managed.
Put quite simply, Pinnacle has increased our sales and more importantly our bottom line.
I said “it was a high stakes decision” six months down the line, do I think It was the right decision? The learning curve was big, bigger than I expected, but categorically yes it was the right decision, we still don’t use all the benefits of pinnacle yet and we are still learning. The directors and I however know that pinnacle will help us to achieve our long term goals. If I could change one thing… we should have moved sooner.”
Learn more from Hollander International during Cars Expo located on Stand E9 or get in touch today www.hollandereu.com or +44 (0)131 538 8538.
