Sage 200 and SalesLogix solution supports start-up enterprise

The company
Mantinga UK Limited supplies high quality European bakery products, delivered frozen ready for baking off or to thaw and serve including speciality breads and rolls and a range of snacks and pastries. The company has an exclusive partnership with a Baltic-based bakery to import its products into the UK and sell on to a growing customer base that includes professional caterers, food service and independent retailers, as well as large national accounts.

“With some very ambitious growth plans Mantinga has to get
customer service right through efficient order processing and
order fulfilment. Our business is all about maintaining good
relationships with our customers and delivering superior
quality product. We believe we have found the right partners in
Sage software and CPiO to help support this.”
Steven Mackintosh, Managing Director

The challenge
As a start up company, Mantinga’s management took the unusual decision to make a substantial investment in IT from the outset. “ We knew that in order to make our mark on this competitive marketplace we would have to get two things right – our processes and our promotion. A flexible, scaleable IT solution was needed to underpin both,” comments Mantinga’s founder and Managing Director, Steven Mackintosh. The company knew that it needed a strong sales order processing and accounts solution to ensure that it could satisfy customer demand and provide excellent customer service in delivery. Furthermore, Mantinga wanted an integrated front office solution that would support the mobile sales force who were calling customers to increase sales and market share.

The solution
Mantinga reviewed a wide choice of off-the-shelf solutions, as well as pursuing a bespoke choice. “We wanted a functional, scaleable solution that would grow with us, but many such products were just too expensive and not nearly flexible enough for Mantinga”.

The company decided upon the Sage MMS commercial solution to support its back office, combined with the Sage SalesLogix CRM system front end. The overall solution, delivered by CPiO, was selected because of its intuitive Microsoft Windows ‘ look and feel’ and its flexibility. “ Here was an off the shelf solution that we could mould to fit our processes and upon which we could add even greater functionality as and when we needed it… CPiO came highly recommended and we liked that we could work with one experienced supplier to deliver an end-to-end solution.”

The benefits
The Sage solution was efficiently implemented, ensuring Mantinga was up and running as quickly as possible. Because of the intuitive nature of the system, users could begin to work with the software almost immediately, with very little training. There were noticeable gains within the sales team through the more efficient management of customer and prospect information in SalesLogix, delivering a return on the initial investment within six months of implementation. Sage MMS quickly contributed to the efficient management of customer orders and delivery, thus ensuring high customer satisfaction and guaranteed repeat business – a key objective for the Mantinga management team.

“Accurate, timely forecasting is key to the business at
present – something that is easily achieved through the
integration of Sage MMS forecasting module and Microsoft Excel”
Steven Mackintosh, Managing Director

The future
Mantinga is currently experiencing a 40% growth month on month with an enviable list of regular customers. Keen to ensure that it remains ahead of the competition, the company is looking to expand market share to include supplying into the wholesale and distribution marketplace, as well as targeting national, strategic accounts and in the future, a network of satellite distribution hubs. Key to this is its investment in IT. “With some very ambitious growth plans Mantinga has to get customer service right through efficient order processing and order fulfilment. Our business is all about maintaining good relationships with our customers and delivering superior quality product. We believe we have found the right partners in Sage software and CPiO to help support this.”