While researching long and hard for the best ERP software for our industry, we came across Muskoka Cabinet Company. Having seen many shops across Canada as well as in Europe and the USA, we knew Muskoka was something special. If you’re in the business to make money and enjoy a great lifestyle, you’ll find this interesting. This is their story...
Everyone who owns or manages a woodworking facility knows the value of CNC. When Muskoka embarked on achieving efficiency through automation more than 15 years ago, it became apparent very early on that CNC was nowhere near enough.
“Sure, we were happy with the flexibility and the speed of how we could produce parts, but there was a real lack of information,” explains company president Luke Elias.
“We needed to know how much jobs were costing, where they were in the production process, and we needed to have material procurement and billing all in one place.”
In 2004, Muskoka implemented ERP software, and its flexibility allowed for the customization of the program to be the all-encompassing source of Muskoka’s management information and production processes. Muskoka has 25 users on the system at any one time, there are eight activity stations, and all front-end employees also have the ERP system on their desktop.
“I don’t care how big or small your shop is, you always need to know how much a job costs and how long it will take, and your customer needs to know when they are going to receive their order. Our ERP gives us all this information,” Elias says.
Muskoka’s process starts at the design stage. The sales staff and designers produce client-ready drawings for sale in their design/engineering software and then import the drawings into the ERP where the job is estimated. A complete estimate can be prepared, and with its built-in customization, will produce a customer friendly quotation.
“You know, there are a ton of cabinet drawing software options out there that claim to do estimates, and we have tried a few,” says Marketing Manager Eric Elias.
“Until we started using our ERP and understood its flexibility and adaptability, we were not successful in producing complete estimates and customer-ready documents. The best part about our ERP is that the whole job is in one place.”
Of course providing estimates is only the first step in the management flow process. Using the ERP, Muskoka can take the same file and produce cabinetry with it by creating door and other outsource material purchase orders; scheduling time needed on the shop floor and producing shipping labels, product labels and packing slips.
The biggest benefit of using the right software is single data entry and real time information transfer. For ex- ample, job information, such as an estimated shipping date, is entered once at the front end and carried all the way through to the back end. In addition, if the information needs to be changed for any reason, only a single entry and the click of a few buttons is needed to update everything.
Revised customer order confirmations also require only a few simple steps. This is extremely important when it comes to product changes at the job level. For example, if a change is made on the ERP software, the work orders at the activity stations are automatically updated.
Muskoka reports sales have increased 4-fold in the last 10 years even though very little has changed in terms of the amount of front-end staff. The company boasts three times the industry average for production output versus plant square footage and employees. They partly attribute this to their diligent pursuit of management information in the most efficient manner, as a result of implementing the right software throughout their processes.
“We produce way more with less, on time, and on budget,” Elias says.
“In today’s marketplace that is the only key to survival. It is nice to go home at the end of the day realizing you are getting the most out of every- thing and that the bottom line reflects that as well.”
Peter Mate is co-owner and president of Planit Canada, a software and services company devoted to servicing the manufacturing industry. For more info, email peterm@planitcanada.ca or visit planitcanada.ca
