Feb/March 2007

Cookie Coach Company says it expects to recoup the cost of a £150,000 mobile sales and marketing system from O4 Corporation 'within twelve months', according to chief executive Mike Levaggi.

Cookie Coach, a leading maker of snack and bakery products, is using the system with its 26 van sales staff. They have been issued with rugged, wireless PDAs for entering information while they are with customers, and the result will be a reduction in administration time and provision of management information to head office in real time.

'Our previous, paper-based system was very inefficient,' Levaggi says. 'Our van sales people had to calculate orders manually and complete paper order forms and stock cards. They can now avoid this and spend more time with customers.'

Order details can be transmitted to the company in real time. This allows for instant feedback to manufacturing, providing a true bake-to-order process to meet demand.

 

'We can now react immediately to increased sales of seasonal lines,' Levaggi says. 'If we place a new line, we want to measure take-up as soon as possible to schedule production. The new system provides for exactly that.'

O4 Corporation worked with Sandpiper Corporation to develop the solution, is based on O4's Field Operations Solution suite. It runs on Intermec 761 ruggedised Pocket PC devices, which are linked to the Cookie Coach Company's headquarters via GPRS.

Established in Australia 1998, O4 Corporation develops and markets handheld mobility solutions for field sales and merchandising operations. Its UK headquarters are in Milton Keynes.