SaaS Consulting Group Helps VP Racing Fuels Speed to Improved Productivity
The Challenge
VP Racing Fuels, Inc., a world leader in performance fuel technology and high-quality specialty fuel blends, has rapidly grown to more than 100 staff members and 7 worldwide locations. Founded in 1974, VP now offers a catalog of nearly 70 racing fuel blends, 60 nitro powered hobby racing fuel blends, high performance small engine ethanol free fuels, a full line of car care and car performance products, gas station branding, and a continually growing roster of VP-fueled champions across the entire spectrum of motorsports.
VP’s reputation for product quality, along with superior service and technical support, helped secure its position as the Official Racing Fuel of the largest racing sanctioning body in the world–NHRA Championship Drag Racing–as well as sponsor of nearly 60 other series and sanctioning bodies, including American LeMans, American Drag Racing League (ADRL), AMA Supercross, Star Mazda, World of Outlaws Sprint Cars and World of Outlaws Late Models among many others.
With this growth, VP found that they were challenged to manage their business with an antiquated accounting system and lack of Sales Force Automation (SFA) solution. In order to understand their business trends, they had to manually recreate sales transactions. And, without an SFA tool, they found it very hard to track the sales forecast and run sales analytics.
Their systems were holding them back. VP needed to find a solution that would improve their business applications infrastructure in order to support the continued and rapid expansion of the business.
VP’s reputation for product quality, along with superior service and technical support, helped secure its position as the Official Racing Fuel of the largest racing sanctioning body in the world–NHRA Championship Drag Racing–as well as sponsor of nearly 60 other series and sanctioning bodies, including American LeMans, American Drag Racing League (ADRL), AMA Supercross, Star Mazda, World of Outlaws Sprint Cars and World of Outlaws Late Models among many others.
With this growth, VP found that they were challenged to manage their business with an antiquated accounting system and lack of Sales Force Automation (SFA) solution. In order to understand their business trends, they had to manually recreate sales transactions. And, without an SFA tool, they found it very hard to track the sales forecast and run sales analytics.
Their systems were holding them back. VP needed to find a solution that would improve their business applications infrastructure in order to support the continued and rapid expansion of the business.
The Solution
Knowing that VP did not want to maintain a data center, SC Wallace of VP Racing Fuels decided to look for cloud-based SFA and ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) solutions. After selecting Salesforce.com as their SFA tool, VP’s Executives, Board of Directors and Wallace conducted a detailed ERP System selection process with the assistance of their Salesforce.com implementation partner and ERP Industry Consultants.
After completing the rigorous selection process similar to the process Wallace had conducted for a number of Fortune 100 companies as a former executive with PricewaterhouseCoopers, Oracle and IBM, VP narrowed its ERP selection down to Oracle, SAP and NetSuite. Following detailed “Pilot” demos, NetSuite not only provided the key Complex Manufacturing Accounting needs to VP, it was the only true cloud-based system that has allowed VP to eliminate all systems and IT support at the company with only Internet Services now being required. VP staff now has access globally to their systems, anywhere the internet is available with any internet-enabled device.
After meeting with the various recommended consulting organizations, including large systems integrators and consulting firms, VP chose SaaS Consulting Group. “Rob Gottschalk (CEO of SaaS Consulting Group) and Rob’s team of business and technical consultants was by far and away the most competent implementation and business partner we saw,” said Wallace. “With Rob’s diverse background in both Sales and Accounting, he truly understood the business challenges we faced.”
Another key factor in the selection of SaaS Consulting Group was the breadth of their service offering. “SaaS Consulting Group is really unique in that they offer implementation services for both Salesforce.com and NetSuite,” Wallace said. “I want one firm who can handle things and make it happen. I don’t have time to manage multiple consulting organizations.”
After completing the rigorous selection process similar to the process Wallace had conducted for a number of Fortune 100 companies as a former executive with PricewaterhouseCoopers, Oracle and IBM, VP narrowed its ERP selection down to Oracle, SAP and NetSuite. Following detailed “Pilot” demos, NetSuite not only provided the key Complex Manufacturing Accounting needs to VP, it was the only true cloud-based system that has allowed VP to eliminate all systems and IT support at the company with only Internet Services now being required. VP staff now has access globally to their systems, anywhere the internet is available with any internet-enabled device.
After meeting with the various recommended consulting organizations, including large systems integrators and consulting firms, VP chose SaaS Consulting Group. “Rob Gottschalk (CEO of SaaS Consulting Group) and Rob’s team of business and technical consultants was by far and away the most competent implementation and business partner we saw,” said Wallace. “With Rob’s diverse background in both Sales and Accounting, he truly understood the business challenges we faced.”
Another key factor in the selection of SaaS Consulting Group was the breadth of their service offering. “SaaS Consulting Group is really unique in that they offer implementation services for both Salesforce.com and NetSuite,” Wallace said. “I want one firm who can handle things and make it happen. I don’t have time to manage multiple consulting organizations.”
The Results
SaaS Consulting Group helped VP increase productivity and efficiency across its sales, manufacturing, inventory and accounting functions. Before the Salesforce.com and NetSuite implementations, VP operated with mostly manual processes due to its antiquated Client/Server Sage ERP system.
Now, with the improved systems and processes, they have been able to centralize the accounting function in their San Antonio headquarters, redeploying headcount from their corporate and field offices to more customer focused and revenue producing activities. Furthermore, VP has gained insight into their sales pipeline, production schedules, inventory management and sales and financial metrics.
VP has seen a very strong ROI on the projects, and they were cash flow positive after the first two months of implementation. “Working with SaaS Consulting Group has been great,” said Wallace. “They delivered the projects on time and within budget, and really helped us to track and understand our business.”
Now, with the improved systems and processes, they have been able to centralize the accounting function in their San Antonio headquarters, redeploying headcount from their corporate and field offices to more customer focused and revenue producing activities. Furthermore, VP has gained insight into their sales pipeline, production schedules, inventory management and sales and financial metrics.
VP has seen a very strong ROI on the projects, and they were cash flow positive after the first two months of implementation. “Working with SaaS Consulting Group has been great,” said Wallace. “They delivered the projects on time and within budget, and really helped us to track and understand our business.”
About VP Racing Fuels
VP Racing Fuels, Inc. Headquartered in San Antonio, TX focuses on the manufacturing and sale of high performance fuels of all types from racing gasoline to small engine and hobby fuels with a supply network of more than 3,000 distributors and dealers globally and a product catalog of more than 70 racing fuel blends, 60 nitro powered hobby racing fuel blends, high performance small engine ethanol free fuels, a full line of car care and car performance products, gas station branding. VP is the official fuel supplier of NHRA Championship Drag Racing, American Le Mans, AMA Supercross, Reno Air Race, World of Outlaws and the Trans-Am Series, are among nearly 60 VP-sponsored racing series and sanctioning bodies.