"The Windows software is absolutely easier for our employees to use and helps us
do our daily work in a faster, more streamlined fashion."
- Gene Yates, Vice President, Southern Fasteners

Previous Solution

Southern Fasteners is a large regional wholesaler and distributor of parts such as screws and nuts, bolts, drill bits, electrical panels, and other kinds of hardware. The company used a proprietary, UNIX-based application for tasks such as tracking inventory, entering orders and managing customer information.

Issues That Previous Solution Caused

The application was difficult for employees to learn and was cumbersome and time-consuming to use.

"For example, whenever you wanted to switch from one task to another—say, looking up a purchase order and then checking inventory—you would have to close out of one screen before opening another one," says Gene Yates, Vice President of Southern Fasteners.

He adds that the UNIX-based software was not very flexible. "Basically, you had to take what they built into the application. You adjusted your business to the software."

How Distribution One Helped

Southern Fasteners evaluated alternatives and chose V2 Fastener, a modular application from Distribution One that manages an array of tasks. Distribution One had migrated its application from UNIX to the Windows Server® operating system to make daily tasks easier for customers. Southern Fasteners started using Distribution One V2 Fastener in January 2007, replacing its UNIX-based business operations software with the new Windows®-based solution.

Benefits gained by using V2 Fastener

"V2 Fastener software is absolutely easier for our employees to use and helps us do our daily work in a faster, more streamlined fashion," says Yates. The benefits that Southern Fasteners received by using V2 fastener included were:

• Our user-friendly interface made navigating between tasks about 75 percent faster than before.
• A flexible solution that was easy to customize and implement.
• Software that integrated easily with Microsoft® Office and their other business application.