When Jason and Gorjana Reidel launched their line of accessible fine jewelry, they took to the road. In fact, the couple covered over 50,000 miles to show their products to retailers and they hit the trade show circuit as well.
The line had instant appeal and before long, the floor of their apartment was a de facto warehouse. Rapid growth followed and today, their dream has become Gorjana, a thriving, creative enterprise with its headquarters in beautiful Laguna Beach, California.
As anyone at a nascent company knows, growth isn’t always easy to manage, especially when it comes to EDI and order management. The goodwill that great brands create can be lost if Trading Partners begin to doubt that commitments can be met. When that happens, opportunities are lost and work must be done to restore productive relationships. For Taylor Beebe, Director of Supply Chain at Gorjana, it’s essential to manage orders and inventory effectively. Meeting the specifications of Trading Partners is not only good business, but Beebe knows that great brands never disappoint. She wants every interaction with Gorjana to be a positive one.
Integrating EDI with an ERP
Integrating EDI with the ERP that Gorjana runs on was an important element of making order management a seamless process. But ERP integration is a daunting task for many companies, since it’s a massive undertaking that seems to carry the potential for disaster at every turn.
“Obviously, this kind of large-scale project has big rewards, but also major risks,” remarked Beebe. “The integration team at eZCom were on top of it, and it’s working smoothly for us.”
With a single portal for managing orders and inventory, manual entry is reduced, along with the possibility of errors. Having an accurate accounting of inventory is especially important as Gorjana expands its Trading Partner network and opens new stores of its own, including its first location in New York City. With EDI data merged with their ERP, Beebe knows she has the most recent data and can respond to orders with confidence.
“As our relationship with eZCom has grown, we have shifted our order flow from a manual process to one that is almost fully automated. And we have expedited the outbound process — pick tickets go straight to the warehouse.”
That’s not all that’s important to Beebe and the team at Gorjana.
A custom approach
“What I really sense is that eZCom is always listening. In fact, whenever we’ve asked about additional features that could help us run our supply chain more efficiently, it’s not long before they are a part of the Lingo application,” added Beebe. “That sort of responsiveness is important to a rapidly growing company like ours, and their whole approach is definitely not one-size-fits-all.”
Gorjana has also been agile, and is constantly adapting to the ever-changing retail environment. They are building additional business through online channels, while their direct-to-consumer sales continue to grow. After initially turning to eZCom for EDI, managing — and merging — orders from all kinds of channels has become increasingly important. The Lingo application is not EDI-only and when it comes to bringing orders and data together, it is definitely up to the task.
As a business grows, so do EDI and order management needs.
For eZCom, being a small part of the Gorjana success story is rewarding. When our clients grow, we take pride in offering them EDI and order management that scales, and leaves them free to focus on the most important parts of their business, like sales and brand-building.
Working with dynamic companies like Gorjana is exciting. But we’ll continue our efforts to make sure their EDI and order management remains routine.
To see the full collection of Gorjana simply beautiful jewelry — timeless, lightweight, easy to wear and designed to be layered — visit their online store. http://www.gorjana.com/
