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Unique Pub Company
A Unique Solution to a Common Problem? Keeping track of a growing business with over 4000 public houses spread across England, Scotland and Wales
Our systems now enable us to see what is selling well - or not so well. We can gather all the information we need to manage that properly and, equally important, link that to other relevant information so we can get a very detailed analysis of costs and benefits and see the bigger picture."
The Background
Unique Pub Company, one of the UKs leading independent pub leasing companies, owning over 4000 pubs across England, Scotland and Wales, varying from traditional inns to cutting edge bar concepts.
The company, no longer depends solely on rents for its income. It now supplies, through its own call centre, all the 2,800 pubs with 200 of the world's top beer, cider, wine and spirits brands.
Almost half of the 200 staff - mainly business development managers, estate managers and building surveyors - are out on the road most of the time servicing customers and driving the business in the right direction.
Communication and the transmission of reliable, accurate information is therefore critical to the organisation but made, by the very nature of the organisation, all the more difficult.
The company is now running two types of software - JD Edwards World software for its financial, property and management systems and Cognos for sales analysis.
The Solution
This was uniquely simple to define - to get both software systems to work harmoniously together.
"We are a busy team," explained Information Systems Manager, Gareth Durban, "so we decided to look for external assistance.
Unique can now take financial and property management information from the JD Edwards system and use the powerful reporting tools of Cognos to subject it to multi-dimensional analysis.
Gareth Durban claims that management information is much better now than ever before and has led to more informed decision-making.
The business is working extremely well and some of the credit for that is due to the quality of information we now receive. They plan to expand the use of Cognos to bring even greater benefits for management accounts reporting.
"We called in Simpson Associates, consultants who specialise in devising and implementing their Business Intelligence (BI) ReadyMade application for business".
"Simpson Associates provided us with a seamless link between JD Edwards and Cognos."
The Benefits
Analysis of Debt
The company can now analyse its debt in a variety of ways.
"At the touch of a button we can see who the top ten debtors are either at the moment or over any rolling period. We can then cut this data any way we want. This has been particularly helpful for the business development managers who can see the performance of the pubs in the areas in a sharper focus. It's led to very useful sharing of best practice".
Quality Information
The Customer Accounts Department team can now access the quality of information they require easily.
"They have always been exceptionally good at controlling debt but now they have more sophisticated tools to help them. It's meant that the same team can deal with a larger number of pubs without an increase in staff. That makes sound commercial sense."
Analysis of Income
This was reasonably straightforward when the company only had rents to consider. Nowadays with the new revenue streams from the sale of wet goods etc, fresh challenges have arisen. Cognos tool shave proved highly useful for doing this.
Saving Time
Time has also been freed up in Durban's IT Department.
In the past his staff, were called upon to prepare a variety of management reports on a regular basis.
The Finance team themselves are now empowered and able to perform the majority of report authoring. IT can now concentrate on IT.
The Bigger Picture
Unique Pubs systems now enable them to see what is selling well - and not so well. All the information needed to manage that process properly is linked to other relevant information so the organisation can get a very detailed analysis of costs and benefits and see the bigger picture.
Durban says part of the reason for the success is that the Simpson Associates' consultants have fitted into the company very neatly and have a strong commercial focus, backed up by good knowledge of accounting and the JD Edwards system.
Simpson Associates' additional contribution has been through HelpDesk Support - given the success of the initial project, Simpson Associates' role has been extended to providing a helpdesk facility to the company.
They have been asked to provide support for all aspects of the implementation of the Cognos software. They have completed a full BI 'healthcheck' to ensure the company makes the most of the information available to it.
They have also worked with Unique to implement Cognos Finance - a powerful tool for financial consolidation and reporting, which has brought major efficiencies in budgeting, forecasting and financial management reporting.
About Simpson Associates
They are personable people, very level-headed and down-to-earth, not the stereotypical consultants at all. They don't baffle people with meaningless jargon but just keep things simple so that everyone can understand what's happening".
Simpson Associates formed 15 years ago, are a Cognos Premier Partner in the UK and have been implementing Performance Management solutions in many industry sectors for over 10 years.
"They also have a pragmatic and relaxed approach. That fits in well with us - we are a leisure company, after all".
We have won the Cognos Partner of the Year award on 5 occasions.
Simpson Associates is a DataMirror Gold Partner in the UK and has successfully implemented data warehouse solutions over the past 7 years.
"They also tell you politely if they think you are barking up the wrong tree. They challenge things, but in a constructive way."
It's an approach that, like a good beer, goes down well - something the Unique Pub Company'
For more information visit http://www.simpson-associates.co.uk.
Simpson Associates
14-18 York Road
Wetherby
West Yorkshire
LS22 6SL
t: +44 (0) 1937 586 880
e: info@simassoc.co.uk
Craven House, 14-18 York Road, Wetherby, West Yorkshire, LS22 6SL
t: +44 (0) 1937 586 880 | f: +44 (0) 1937 541 135 | e: Simpson Associates
