Thomas D. Mangelsen, Inc.
We’re sitting in the office of Dana Henricksen who is President of Thomas D. Mangelsen, Inc., wholesale and retail distributor for the famous wildlife photographer, Thomas D. Mangelsen. Today we’re not talking about the many products that include Mangelsen’s breathtaking photographs. We’re talking about the infrastructure behind the management of this efficient, fast-growing company: its information network.
Henricksen, who has more than 30 years of experience with data processing and information management, many of them in banking, tells us how he began working with Bizco Technologies. “We issued an RFP for an integrated data processing solution supporting manufacturing, distribution, accounting, inventory control and retail point-of-sale.” he remembers. “After issuing the RFP, we went through an elimination process to choose the right company.”
Bizco brought a networking solution to the table as a partner with Triadix, a technology company that specializes in software applications. Henricksen was looking for a turnkey solution that would include both hardware and software to support the company’s headquarters office, 14 corporate galleries and four licensed galleries throughout the nation. The solution would encompass systems from point of sale to shipment and everything in between.
At the time of the RFP in 2001, Henricksen was working with a different outside supplier and two systems, one for POS database management, and the other for accounting, manufacturing and distribution. Custom software interfaced the two systems.
The setup had served them well for five years, but as the company grew, Henricksen knew he needed to put new technologies to use to make the growing company and its storefronts more efficient. There had been duplicated data entry, for example, and the galleries’ software was different from the distributors’ and headquarters’ software. “We knew we could upgrade,” he explains, “But we’d still have a custom patch between the two. Then, every time something changes, you have to go in and reinvent it.”
One of the main objectives of the new system was to provide information in real time for the galleries. “The key was ease of use,” Henricksen said, “It needed to be straightforward and intuitive.” In the RFP, he also instructed that the system must be easily expandable and fairly inexpensive to maintain. The company plans to continue adding gallery locations and the additions have to be quick and as seamless as possible.
After weighing the pros and cons of the RFP respondents, the evaluation group from the Company chose the Bizco/Triadix team—Bizco, for the network solution and ongoing system support side of things. “The advantage [of working with Bizco] is that I’m a big fish in a little pool, instead of a little fish in a really big pool,” he said. In addition, Henricksen knew Paul Zoz, Bizco president, from past projects. “I knew Paul’s work ethic,” Henricksen said, “and that when I have a need I will get an appropriate response.”
Bizco created an integrated, real time network structure using a Triadix upgradeable financial management software solution. The system includes the enterprise access thin client technology of Citrix, which at the time of the RFP was not as commonplace as it is today. It was a creative, cutting edge solution that Bizco could provide because the company has a policy of staying up-to-date with industry knowledge and certifications.
After deploying the original system, Bizco instituted a round-the-clock proactive monitoring, troubleshooting and maintenance process to keep things going without a hitch. Bizco engineers monitor the system from a remote IT response center located at Bizco headquarters, with occasional on-site visits. According to Henricksen, the beauty of the system is that on-site visits are seldom necessary, which is important because of the company’s geographic diversity. Problems are identified sometimes even before they manifest for end users. Under their contract, Bizco provides replacements for failed equipment within 24 hours.
This comprehensive view of network management is what managed services is all about. It means Bizco takes responsibility for operation of the network as a whole, as if they were an in-house IT department. You also could call it “virtual IT” because much of the work happens remotely. Remote access makes it possible to monitor the system constantly, rather than popping in at intervals. Henricksen believes managed services provides his company with savings in time, money and headaches.
With a managed services mindset, Henricksen and his in-house IT manager, Bob Kennedy, can reach Bizco any time day or night, if needed. The company requires around-the-clock service to accommodate its retail operations located across three time zones. The first gallery opens at 7 a.m. CST and the last closes at 2 a.m. CST.
We recently had an issue that became critical to one of our new galleries opening in Scottsdale,” Henricksen said. “I was able to pick up the phone, call Paul, and within hours we had a resolution to our problem.” Hendricksen went on to say that he is comfortable working with Bizco partly because he senses some of the same business philosophies that Thomas D. Manglesen, Inc., embraces. “Bizco is like us. We always take customer calls and make sure they are satisfied. That’s the kind of business they run.”
Zoz returns a compliment to Henricksen and Kennedy for their expansive view of the working partnership with Bizco. “This client was very open,” Zoz said. “We could go to them and say, ‘Here’s an issue.’ There was and still is an open dialogue, and that makes everything work smoothly.”
One of the best things about Bizco’s services, from Henricksen’s perspective, is that he is charged a flat monthly fee for whatever it takes to keep the network running. “It costs considerably less than if we had to do it ourselves,” he said. “I’m not investing the time of my staff to fix the problem. There are lots of problems we don’t even have to worry about tracking and fixing, such as eliminating viruses. It’s going on in the background, from security to virus protection and monitoring the network 24/7.”
The flat fee also transforms the way service is delivered. There is more incentive for the network company to make things work right the first time, because all maintenance costs are included in the fixed contract. “Support calls now cost us rather than the customer,” Zoz explains, “so our goal becomes helping our customers reduce the number of problems and therefore the number of calls.”
With the previous vendor, Thomas D. Mangelsen, Inc., paid a fee every time something went wrong. Henricksen and Kennedy found themselves not calling the supplier until it was necessary, then enduring down time until things were fixed. “I might as well have an in-house department if I pay per call,” Henricksen said. He points out that companies also can end up paying more yearly when they buy network services ala carte. Worst of all, with a pay-as-you-go arrangement, the costs can unexpectedly balloon.
Henricksen knows by going out of house with IT he also avoids having to pay for in-house training. “There are tremendous economies of scale with managed services. Bizco can spread out all the staff and resources on a cost effective basis. It’s much cheaper than we could do ourselves,” he explained. “Plus, they have all the headaches. I’d have to have four guys to do it in-house, and as it is we have only one guy who is the quarterback (Kennedy) who takes the ball to people who know how to fix the problem.”
Paul Zoz, Bizco President points out that Henricksen’s company also avoids wrestling with ever-changing new technology. “It’s our job to stay in front of technology and bring it to Thomas D. Mangelsen, Inc.,” he said. “Then, when we find clients with like needs, we can spread out the cost of learning new technology.”
Even if he did want to pay in-house personnel, Henricksen believes it’s impossible to hire and keep people of the caliber he gets in his partnership with Bizco.
“You’re never going to keep talented people, because it’s boring to sit here and monitor the same locations,” he explains. “They want new challenges and exciting things to do, and that’s hard to give them when it’s mostly maintenance. They get bored and go elsewhere and you spend all of your time training new people.”
With a managed services contract, Zoz said, Bizco can help customers focus on their businesses without the added burden of managing IT. “You want access to infrastructure,” he said, “but you don’t have to own the computer systems. Clients can hire a company like Bizco to handle the network, then they can spend all their time becoming really good at what they do.”
In addition, according to Zoz, the managed services idea takes network management beyond an ala carte service to a critical presence in any SMB company’s overall operation. “With managed services, we actually help influence a company’s business processes for a successful future,” he said.
All of these things help Bizco’s managed services SMB clients keep costs down while benefiting from the same efficient IT solutions large companies design themselves. “Companies have to and want to embrace new technology these days. It’s a fact of life,” Zoz said. “But they shouldn’t have to keep paying unpredictable costs. With managed services, they can choose not to keep putting money out without finding real top-to-bottom solutions.”
Henricksen rises from his chair as we prepare to leave his office, and stresses how pleased he is with the outcome of his RFP and the relationship he has built with Bizco. It has to do with saving time and money, and becoming more efficient—but it also has to do with business style. “We have a common philosophy that is best summed up in the word integrity. That encompasses lots of things. One is that the customer is to be happy, and you do what you have to. We do what we say we’re going to do. We under promise and over deliver. I sense that in Bizco, and we’ve experienced that in Bizco.”
