The Advertising Specialty Institute® (ASI) of Trevose, PA, announced Top 40 supplier BIC Graphic and its proprietary brands, BIC® and Norwood®, are now directly connected to ASI’s ESP®. Distributors can now submit orders for BIC (asi/40480) and Norwood (asi/74400) products directly from the ESP Web® platform, eliminating the need to send orders via email, fax or phone. In addition, distributors can now check inventory levels in real time for those products and receive real-time order status updates directly from the suppliers – all in ESP.
With 2015 sales of $321.2 million, BIC Graphic ranked No. 4 on ASI’s most recent annual Top 40 ranking of the biggest companies in the $22 billion promotional products industry.
“We are excited to add real-time information about order status and inventory to the ASI technology platform,” said Tim Nale, director of IT for BIC Graphic North America. “Putting this information at the distributors’ fingertips provides a real advantage to them. The addition of well-formed electronic orders speeds the process and reduces errors, both great wins for our customers. The collaborative nature of ASI’s technology team made this a good experience for all involved.”
As of today, over 75 suppliers – a mix of Top 40, mid-sized and small companies – are in the process of integrating with ESP, with more than 30 suppliers already offering live inventory. In July, Top 40 suppliers The Magnet Group (asi/68507) and Hit Promotional Products (asi/61125) became the first major suppliers to take advantage of direct integration with ESP.
“Direct integration in ESP represents nothing less than the future of the promotional product industry and ASI is moving as fast as possible to bring suppliers of all sizes on board, reducing response time and increasing efficiency throughout the industry,” said Timothy M. Andrews, president and chief executive officer of ASI.
As suppliers become e-commerce-enabled in the new ESP platform, distributors will be able to seamlessly place orders and receive status updates directly from suppliers without leaving ESP.
ASI distributors are now enjoying the benefits of the new ESP CRM and Orders, which allows distributors to easily add existing contacts and view all past conversations by clicking on a company’s profile, where all orders, quotes and shared presentations pop into view, simplifying re-orders.
Since it’s synced with ESP’s robust product database, the new ESP Orders auto-populates all product data, eliminating rekeying of information.
Suppliers tell ASI that about 70% of promotional product orders sent by distributors are incomplete, leading to numerous emails and follow-up phone calls. By managing all daily business operations in ESP, and viewing inventory and product info at a glance, distributors can save an estimated 45 minutes per day, thanks to increased efficiency. MORE INFO