SAP Business One Dresses the IT Landscape for Success
Leveraging Hosted Software and an Industry Template
Since 1982 the Christopher Lena Shirt Co. has prided itself on creating high-quality dress shirts for men. The company produces approximately 500,000 shirts annually in various brands, colors, and styles. Its popular Modena and Christopher Lena Classic comfort shirt lines offer impeccable construction and attention to detail in a range of classic and modern styles.
Based in Carson, California, the company’s 12 fulltime, in-house employees collaborate with suppliers and overseas manufacturers to bring apparel to market. The shirts are designed by Christopher Lena’s on-staff apparel designers at company headquarters, where all operational and supply chain processes are managed as well. These processes include sales, marketing, order processing, customer service, accounts receivables, and warehouse logistics and fulfillment.
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Since 1982 the Christopher Lena Shirt Co. has prided itself on creating high-quality dress shirts for men. The company produces approximately 500,000 shirts annually in various brands, colors, and styles. Choosing what to wear is a lot like choosing the right software. Both need to offer the correct style, size, and value. For the Christopher Lena Shirt Co., known for its bold styles and unsurpassed quality, it was time for a makeover. Its legacy software was too constrictive and didn’t support the company’s long-term vision. In the SAP Business One — Fashion One solution, Christopher Lena found a much better fit — one that provides better visibility, efficiency, and control.
While Christopher Lena’s shirt designs are “fashion forward,” the legacy software the company had deployed was holding it back from expanding its customer base. “We were using an industry solution that was adequate but it couldn’t scale going forward,” says Leonard Kang, operations manager at Christopher Lena. The software supported order entry and production processes, but accounting and order tracking had to be handled in separate software solutions such as QuickBooks and Microsoft Excel. For a company in the apparel industry that must always think ahead to the next season, the newest trend, and the latest styles — this inefficient way of working was a liability.
“The next logical step for us was to adopt an integrated software solution that was suited for a business of our size and for our industry.” Leonard Kang, Operations Manager, Christopher Lena Shirt Co.
The company considered several enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions including nVision, NetSuite, and the SAP Business One OnDemand solution, an on-demand version of the SAP Business One application. After careful consideration, Christopher Lena selected SAP Business One OnDemand with the Fashion One add-on solution by
Softengine Inc.
“We decided to find a partner we could put our trust in,” Kang explains. “Softengine is very experienced and systemized in its approach. We were very confident we’d made the right choice.” “Small businesses might be intimidated by SAP software. What they don’t realize is that SAP offers solutions designed specifically for small to midsize companies like ours.”
Christopher Lena was up and running with its new software within three months. With SAP Business One OnDemand, Christopher Lena now has a single software solution to support all critical business processes. The Fashion One add-on integrates with the SAP software to help the company manage finished inventory, raw materials, cutting tickets, allocations, accounts payable and receivable, and bar codes. Flexible definitions of the matrix make SKU generation intuitive, powerful, and automated. Business operations are more tightly linked and efficient. “Having integrated customer relationship management practices gives us much better insight and control over receivables,” Kang explains.
With SAP Business One OnDemand, Christopher Lena has been able to improve operations and increase insight with minimal cost and complexity. “With SAP software and Fashion One, we have better insight across our entire value chain to support business decisions, improve our margins, and expand our customer base.”