Customer Solution Case Study
/ / Operator of Fazoli’s and Long John Silver’s Grows Their Business
Overview
Country or Region:United States
Industry:Management
Customer Profile
Nellis Management Company operates Fazoli’s and Long John Silver’s restaurants. The company is involved in a co-branding, co-location initiative with A&W restaurants.
Business Situation
An ‘ancient’ Microsoft® MS-DOS®—based system allowed little to no integration with other applications, resulted in many manual processes for employees, and experienced frequent crashes.
Solution
Nellis selected Microsoft Business Solutions–Great Plains® paired with MenuLink restaurant management software.
Benefits
Increased productivity
Reduction of paper
Scalability to support growth
Software stability / "I certainly have been impressed with the stability of the system."
Jon Harmsen, Chief Financial Officer, Nellis Management Company
Nellis Management Company is better known to the American public by the two popular restaurant concepts they operate: Fazoli's and Long John Silver's.
In 2001, as their business began to grow, Nellis found that their old Microsoft MS-DOS—based software product, from a company no longer in existence, would not support their expansion plans nor even their day-to-day operational needs. The old system had very limited reporting capabilities, did not provide for integration of their back office and point of sale systems, and crashed frequently.
Integrating Microsoft Business Solutions–Great Plains with MenuLink restaurant management software has given Nellis the ability to divert labor resources to more productive work; improve the timeliness, quantity, and quality of reporting data; decrease reporting costs; minimize data entry errors; and decrease reliance on spreadsheets.
Situation
The public may not recognize the name Nellis Management Company, but they will certainly recognize the two restaurant concepts they operate: Long John Silver's and Fazoli's. Nellis Management is a restaurant and real estate management company based in America's Heartland—Urbandale, Iowa.
In the mid-1960s, the Levitt family started a restaurant holding company, which later came to be known as Nellis Management Company. They began by growing a fast food hamburger business called Jeff's into five stores in the Des Moines area.
In the mid-1970s, Nellis entered into a partnership with a young company they felt had great potential, Long John Silver's. Their judgment proved correct as over the next 10 years, Nellis opened more than 30 Long John Silver's restaurants.
In 1995, Nellis identified another company that they felt was going to stand the test of time, Fazoli's. Nellis entered into a joint venture partnership with Fazoli's, and they have now opened 21 Fazoli's restaurants.
Nellis has recently undertaken the co-branding of Long John Silver's and A&W restaurants, with the two restaurants co-located in the same building. The success of the co-branding initiative has been tremendous, and the concept will be rolled out to many of their locations during the next several years.
When Jon Harmsen came to Nellis Management as Chief Financial Officer in 2001, he found Nellis running a dated Microsoft® MS-DOS®—based accounting software. In fact, the software was so old that the company that made it was no longer in business. The software included a small set of reports that could be exported to a print file only. In order to customize the reports at all, data had to be manually typed in. This limitation meant that not only was the process consuming inordinate amounts of manual labor, the manually adjusted reports had to be photocopied, addressed, and mailed to the 50 restaurants across 6 states.
Another issue was that the old solution allotted a fixed amount of disk space. When the disk space was exceeded, they had to purge data or go through a complicated process to expand file sizes. Not only did the solution have little to no ability to interface with other software products, it was unreliable, causing employees to often speculate, 'I wonder if the system will crash again today.'
Solution
It was clearly time for change, and Harmsen's first major task was to immediately begin to search for a new accounting solution. The company looked at MAS90 and Sage, but in the end, they selected Microsoft Business Solutions–Great Plains®. One of the reasons for Nellis' selection was the professional manner of the reselling partner, QCI of Des Moines, Iowa, who seemed to understand Nellis Management's issues and offered plausible solutions.
Harmsen also felt that the Microsoft Great Plains solution was more intuitive than the other options. The connection with Microsoft and the promise of significant upgrades was also a factor in their decision.
The scalability of the Microsoft Great Plains solution meant that Nellis Management could grow significantly in size and not outgrow their software solution, and growth was an important part of their current and future plans.
The Reselling Partner
Harmsen needed assistance from reselling partner, QCI of Des Moines, in determining an implementation strategy. Having worked through a number of similar conversions, he was able to do most of the actual implementation work himself. Transferring the data required partner assistance, and once completed, the remainder of the installation process was quite easy. Harmsen reports that in two weeks, they were able to load three prior years of data and complete the installation.
Ben Richardson of QCI comments on the implementation and how they work with clients. "At QCI, our approach to technology begins with forming a deep understanding of our client's business objectives. QCI consultants work closely with the Nellis team to ensure that QCI understands Nellis' business objectives and processes. This close collaboration was a key component of this successful project." Richardson says.
Nellis later expanded the new solution to the Long John Silver's restaurant concept.
The ISV Solution
An integral part of the solution was the vertical restaurant management software provided by MenuLink Computer Solutions, Inc., a leading independent developer of restaurant software for independents and chain operators. MenuLink was interfaced with Microsoft Great Plains and implemented as a total solution in 2001 for the Fazoli's restaurant concept portion of their business.
Terri Williams, Executive Vice President of MenuLink Computer Solutions, Inc., says, "It's a pleasure working with a professional company such as Nellis Management. They did their homework before choosing the necessary partners best suited for their business. Through their due diligence, they understood the power of MenuLink's back office products and its integration capability to Microsoft Great Plains as the solution needed to move their Fazoli's and Long John Silver's restaurants forward. It's great gratification knowing we're a vital piece of their aggressive growth plans and future success."
Williams also comments on the partnership between their company and Microsoft Business Solutions. "We are proud to say our relationship with Microsoft Business Solutions has brought a successful solution to many of our customers. I couldn't be more excited knowing that MenuLink and Microsoft Business Solutions together will be providing timely necessary information as Nellis grows in 2004 and beyond. We look forward to making this partnership a success for many years to come," Williams says.
Integration Manager
The Integration Manager module is key for Nellis; it is a tool they use on a daily basis. The MenuLink data is loaded into Nellis' home office version of the MenuLink software, then exported into Microsoft Great Plains.
FRx Desktop
Harmsen enjoys working with Microsoft Business Solutions for Analytics–FRx® Desktop. "I spend three minutes manipulating a Microsoft FRx report in a layout similar to what I need, and I've got the report that gives me the information I need. It's flexible, powerful, and a great way to get summary data out of Microsoft Great Plains," says Harmsen. "It really meets my requirements for pulling financial data from the system as well as working with non-financial data to create different ratios."
Although they are not taking advantage of Business Portal yet, Harmsen is looking forward to using it in the future. "I see that over time, [Business Portal] will become very useful to us and allow us to better connect to our data from wherever we might be."
Benefits
Labor and Productivity Gains
With the old solution, it took a minimum of two weeks and four employees to complete month-end closing for each of the two restaurant concepts. With the Microsoft Great Plains and MenuLink solution, they are completing closing in three days. They have saved approximately 14 person days per month, cutting processing time almost in half. They have been able to divert one FTE who used to work on the old accounting system to assist with payroll, and they are looking forward to further business growth that will maximize their labor resources.
Expense Savings and Improved Information for Decision Making
With the previous software, Nellis was required to print and manually customize the limited reports, make photocopies, and mail the packets to their 50 restaurants. Using Microsoft FRx Desktop, the reports can be customized and e-mailed to the restaurants. Instead of waiting four to five days to receive the reports in the mail, the restaurants now receive the profit and loss statements via e-mail two weeks earlier than previously, providing each restaurant's management with valuable information that assists in making operational corrections to maximize their profitability. The new solution also saves the labor and mailing costs incurred by the old manual report distribution process.
In addition, operating costs have been decreased as the cumbersome, unreliable manual steps necessary to move data from one system to another have been eliminated.
Software Stability
Harmsen reports that he has been impressed with the stability of the software. "I've had extremely few issues running the system," says Harmsen. "When we have had problems, it's been due to user error or hardware problems that caused a file corruption."
Ability to Grow the Business
Using the old system, Harmsen reports it would have been impossible to grow the company without additional staff, and adding to the load on the precarious software would have been risky. Without increasing staff, Harmsen estimates they could now add 50 percent more restaurants under the Microsoft Great Plains and MenuLink solution. In addition to acquiring restaurants, they are completing major remodeling projects in the restaurants which are being co-branded and co-located with A&W restaurants. This new approach has provided Nellis with an additional 40 percent and higher revenue increase at those locations.
Nellis is now positioned well to support continued growth with their Microsoft Business Solutions and MenuLink solution.
Microsoft Business Solutions
Microsoft Business Solutions offer integrated business applications and services that allow small and midsize organizations and divisions of large enterprises to connect employees, customers, and suppliers for improved efficiency. The financial management, customer relationship management, supply chain management, and analytics applications work with other Microsoft software, including the Microsoft Office System and the Windows operating system, to streamline processes across an entire organization. This gives businesses insight to respond rapidly, plan strategically, and execute quickly. Microsoft Business Solutions are delivered through a worldwide network of channel partners that provide specialized services and local support tailored to a company’s needs.
For more information about Microsoft Business Solutions, go to: