Posted by Adrian Bridgwater, Guest Blogger
For John Cirocco, the Vice President of Operations and Information Technology at KegWorks (opens in new tab), SuiteWorld is part networking event, part learning experience and part public presentation.
For instance, one year while attending the conference on behalf of his company, a Buffalo, N.Y.-based specialist supplier of bar equipment to the trade and “home bar” consumer markets, he found himself giving his own impromptu demonstration. Cirocco had figured out a way to have one NetSuite saved search drill down into another. He mentioned this to another attendee and, when they expressed an interest, he agreed to meet up after the last session to give an informal laptop demo in a hotel lobby bar. Apparently word spread – and so Cirocco ended up giving a demo that night to 12 others and then did a repeat showing the next day over in the conference during lunch.
KegWorks, which sells a line of highly sought after bar trappings ranging from kegs and faucets, to tap handles and cocktail related ingredients and paraphernalia for both commercial and residential customers, is attending SuiteWorld (opens in new tab) for the fifth time. Every previous visit has allowed its staff to network with other small to medium-sized businesses owners and uncover a “tip, trick or technique” that has effectively saved KegWorks at least the cost of the conference, according to Cirocco.
Another year, Cirocco recalled seeing a demo of Celigo’s SmartClient product at the partner’s booth.
“While I thought it was ‘cute’ I wasn’t sure if it would apply to our needs,” he said. “But after returning from the conference we stumbled upon a need to do inventory adjustments through Excel to automate the cycle count process. I immediately remembered the demo and connected the dots to the Celigo tool. We now use SmartClient religiously to automate the various warehouse transactions inventory adjustments and warehouse transfers that we do.”
KegWorks has used the NetSuite platform to position itself for even more dynamic online retailing growth in the years ahead. The firm has relied upon what Cirocco called “NetSuite’s extreme customization capabilities” and scalability to expand its commercial scope without the growing pains traditionally associated with back office systems. And, while he is no longer a developer, Cirocco explains that he has received immeasurable help specifically on the NetSuite user group forum as well as from SuiteWorld contacts he has made with regard to saved searches, scripts and general system usage. As a whole, the company feels that it knows it is not alone when dealing with a particular issue and so has come to rely on the NetSuite community for its knowledge of best practices, Cirocco said.