C&O Nursery Grows with Flexible Acumatica ERP
Customer Company Size
Mid-size Company
Region
- America
Country
- United States
Product
- Acumatica Distribution Edition
- Advanced Financial management
- Inventory Management
- Order Management
- Acumatica Payroll
Tech Stack
- .Net technology
Implementation Scale
- Enterprise-wide Deployment
Impact Metrics
- Productivity Improvements
- Customer Satisfaction
Technology Category
- Functional Applications - Enterprise Resource Planning Systems (ERP)
- Functional Applications - Inventory Management Systems
Applicable Industries
- Agriculture
Applicable Functions
- Logistics & Transportation
- Procurement
Use Cases
- Inventory Management
- Supply Chain Visibility
Services
- System Integration
About The Customer
C&O Nursery is a 113-year-old, family-owned finished-tree nursery, one of the oldest in Washington State and the country. It primarily sells apples, pear and cherry trees to orchard growers around the world as well as to consumers. The company, now run by the third generation, was the first to patent a fruit variety, a peach, making it a pioneer in what’s now become an industry focused on proprietary varieties. C&O holds 20 of its own fruit patents and sells some patented fruit varieties owned by others. The company has grown revenues to more than $12 million and is expanding into new patented varieties as growers demand them.
The Challenge
C&O Nursery, a 113-year-old, family-owned finished-tree nursery, was facing challenges due to the changing dynamics of the commercial fruit growing business. The industry was shifting from open varieties to patented varieties and higher density orchards. This meant that more trees were needed and growers were ordering as many as four years in advance. C&O Nursery was using Microsoft Dynamics GP for accounting and payroll, along with special inventory software based on Microsoft Access 97. However, the team grew frustrated with the outdated software systems. They were looking for a single system for inventory and accounting that could adapt to new ways of doing business, integrate its financial and inventory data and update other systems to accommodate the growth of its seasonal workforce.
The Solution
C&O Nursery decided to switch to Acumatica, a flexible system built on .Net technology. Acumatica offered the flexibility and integration C&O needed. It was browser-based, accepted many third-party applications, and allowed PC Bennett to create the customizations needed for the nursery business. Acumatica also offered mobile access, flexibility, one connected system, and offered the financial, contract, and process controls the company needed. With Acumatica, C&O could track trees at different growth stages and different time lapses, collecting and recording data including the width of the tree stem and the height. To track orders over multiple years, PC Bennett designated virtual warehouses labeled with a year so C&O could track all the activity and orders to be delivered for that year.
Operational Impact
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