Case Study

A Conduit to Success - DDI System Distribution Management Software Powers Reardon Electric Supply

The Reardon family has a long history in electrical distribution. James Reardon Sr., an electrical supply veteran started the family business with his son, James Jr. in 1974. Since its inception, the father/son supply house has enjoyed great success in delivering superior customer service to its client base. Today, James Reardon, Jr. is president of the technology-savvy distribution house. Based in Roslindale, MA, Reardon Electric Supply is a growing, single-location wholesaler of electrical supplies to the greater Boston area.

In the early 1980s, Reardon knew technology would play a critical role in the growth of his supply house. Reardon first turned to a custom solution from a distribution software vendor. "Although the solution ran our operations smoothly for 12 years, it didn't offer any added value or functionality," he said. "Not surprisingly, the vendor folded due to lack of customers."

Reardon then implemented another package that came highly recommended and touted as delivering powerful accounting tools. "Unfortunately, the system lacked a functional order entry system and the accounting side was horrid," he said. "It turns out we were victims of clever marketing. The solution offered a limited feature set and was much too cumbersome to use on a daily basis." This ultimately led Reardon to search for a replacement system.

During the evaluation process, Reardon was steered to DDI by a larger distribution software vendor. "While the company did not want to lose a sale, they thought DDI would be a better fit for our smaller and more focused operations," Reardon said. "After implementing DDI in our warehouse, we were impressed with the expansive feature set that came standard with the solution - and it was significantly less expensive than the larger distribution providers. We saved about $70,000 with DDI over the larger providers."

Reardon Electric Supply has been using the DDI Distribution Management System since March 2003 to manage all counter sales, account receivables and payables, and purchase items. According to Reardon, the supply house is constantly rearranging its warehouse to meet customer demand by viewing the top 300 products and accessories in the DDI System. "We are always using the system to see which items are selling well, and based on that information, we stock up on those popular products," he said. "In addition, we nearly eliminated postage costs by using the system's email and fax functionality."

The supply house is also taking full advantage of DDI's advanced reporting functionality. At the close of each month, Reardon and his team uses DDI's reporting features to break down the wholesaler's business into various categories including inventory, revenues and product sales.

In terms of future upgrades, Reardon is considering DDI's signature capture solution in conjunction with a major credit card provider to streamline the payment process. "We also want to integrate the email functionality, as well as the customer receipt upgrade," he said. "The upgrades from DDI are always timely and inexpensive, especially for a smaller wholesaler with less disposable income. On the flipside, our other distribution providers only offered upgrades every two years."

Reardon strongly recommends DDI Distribution Management Software for small distribution wholesalers because of DDI's focused customer service and extensive training courses. "DDI customer support agents are highly knowledgeable on the system and can quickly help us resolve any technical issues," he added. According to Reardon, novice technology users will benefit from the DDI System since the software interface is easy to navigate, yet so intuitive.