McDaids

McDaids is a leading bathroom, plumbing and tile merchant established in 1974 on the Isle of Doagh. Family-run, the company sells to tradespeople and the public from their extensive store in Buncrana, County Donegal. In their quest for growth, McDaids have used and evaluated many systems and chose K8 Trader, the comprehensive cloud-based solution for small to medium-sized businesses from Kerridge Commercial Systems (KCS), as their new ERP and business management software provider. 

It’s great that K8 Trader is fast. Product enquiries happen instantly, meaning we can serve customers quickly and further improve our service levels.

Lisha Mhlanga, McDaid’s IT & Marketing Executive

K8 Trader's 'one-screen' functionality is one of the key features that sets it apart from other merchant businesses. Such accessibility enables staff members of all abilities to administer various parts of the business efficiently and provides instant access to the necessary information. Additionally, the tile-specific features of K8 Trader create a smoother sales process. For example, one big challenge for tile merchants is calculating the number of tiles needed for a project, but K8 Trader's features help simplify this process.

Instead of sales staff working out tile shipping requirements by hand, they simply input the length and width into K8 Trader to instantly learn how many tiles and boxes they need. It’s a very intelligent system, yet so simple in how it helps us maximise sales.

Lisha Mhlanga, McDaid’s IT & Marketing Executive

McDaids also found their previous ERP system took too long to process sales orders and enquiries. With K8 Trader's fast Sales Order Processing module, products and records appear instantly. As the movements are updated immediately within the system, McDaids can confidently sell without multiple checks.

'Before, we'd have to devote two days to running stock takes. But with K8 Trader, sales and goods received update immediately, so we always have the correct closing stock value. Also, seeing instant trading stats - with positive and negative results for each line - saves time and helps make better decisions. K8 Trader is a real game changer for us.'

Lisha Mhlanga, McDaid’s IT & Marketing Executive

Highlights:

• Remote system access for off-site trading
• Improved product margins allow more informed customer pricing
• Batch invoice processing is now around four times faster
• Enhanced stock reporting to identify slow-moving items

‘We’re delighted to partner with McDaids,’ explains James Mitchell, KCS UK & Ireland Managing Director. ‘We’re always innovating and delivering software solutions to help our customers be more successful.

One such example is WebPro, our fully integrated B2B and B2C web platform, which McDaids will shortly introduce in their business. Once in place, McDaids will save more time and lose that second layer of processing as orders taken on the website feed directly into their management system for immediate processing.’

‘We can trade with increased confidence because K8 Trader is a cloud-based system,’ Lisha concludes. ‘We know that all our customer data is secure and protected in case of any cyber-attack or system failure. So, we can get on with providing outstanding service to our customers without worrying about backups or server maintenance.'