Microfiber Wholesale Case Study
Microfiber Wholesale is a third generation owned and operated business that was founded in 1946, and started by selling mops, brooms, and brushes wholesale to janitorial supply and hardware stores. In the early 2000's, they began focusing entirely on microfiber, relying primarily on their eCommerce site and Amazon to drive sales.
With this shift to eCommerce came the growing need to be able to control inventory using a software that can not only manage a warehouse, but could also communicate current stock levels to online marketplaces.
"With an eCommerce based product business, it's really important to keep control of your inventory and have your website and other sales channels communicating with your inventory program", Brett told us. "We were having a really hard time managing our inventory and preventing stockouts, and our shipping process was broken so we really needed a system that would help us manage inventory and streamline the pick pack and ship process."
Initially through a referral, Brett discovered Finale, and researched Finale through various review sites, before finally picking up the phone and giving us a call. Having tried other software solutions, Microfiber Wholesale decided to give Finale a try.
Working With Finale Inventory to Drive Success
"Before we started using Finale we had an order error rate of 2-3%. Since we started using Finale, we’ve gone to 0.2% error rate."
"She came back within 15 minutes and said she loved it", Brett said, on having the company's software implementor try Finale. "Getting her on board was key, and she was on board within minutes."
Microfiber Wholesale also transitioned to using ShipStation at the same time as they implemented Finale Inventory. Brett told us that when they were evaluating inventory software, it was very important that it also worked well with shipping software. Since Finale Inventory integrates seamlessly with ShipStation, we checked that box for him.
“Finale and ShipStation have proven to be a really powerful combination for us. It has totally transformed the way we pick pack and ship. The process is so smooth and so foolproof anybody can step in on any given day and start picking successfully”
Brett Haney, President
Warehouse management is an important aspect to their business. Microfiber Wholesale utilizes Finale's Barcode Scanner App to pick, pack and ship, as well as to receive purchase orders and input stock adjustments.
Since MicroFiber Wholesale imports their products, they are continually receiving large shipments of their product. Finale's Barcode Scanner app allows them to receive the product both by the case and by the unit. One useful ability of the scanner that saves Brett and his team a lot of time is the ability to scan a case barcode and have Finale receive the corresponding number of units contained in that case.
"I've been running this company for decades and I've never been able to look at my computer and trust what it told me I had in stock. Now I can"
"And it's right, all the time. I'll send a message out to the warehouse manager to check something and they always come back and the number they counted is the same." Brett told us.
"For the first time in this businesses 75 year history, we didn't work on December 31st, which has always been the day that we counted inventory."
Microfiber Wholesale conducts periodic stock counts throughout the year on their products to ensure that stock levels are always accurate at all times using the Finale Inventory Barcode App's Stock Take function.
The initial implementation of Finale Inventory took Microfiber Wholesale less than a month before they were fully up and running with the software. According to Brett, "Basically out of the box, it did almost everything we needed it to, and we felt we could implement it really quickly".
"Finale is a big reason why our last year was the most profitable year we’ve ever had."
Brett Haney, President
Microfiber Wholesale use Finale Inventory to track inventory, pick pack and ship orders, receive shipments, set up automatic ordering, receive notifications, and manage marketplace inventory.
Learn more about Finale Inventory by browsing our website, or better yet, check out our other customer success stories to learn more!
By Fred Ferrari