Creative Brief

When we started this process, we had an e-store for merchandise that employees weren’t utilizing and that wasn't accurately reflective of our brand. It had become outdated with overstocked and unappealing inventory. This deterred employees, resulting in purchases from outside vendors and brand inconsistencies. Using outside vendors meant our existing stock sat unpurchased, creating excessive warehousing costs.

To solve these challenges, we created a steering committee made up of employees from our marketing and supply chain departments. They worked together to define goals for the new site — a user-friendly, visually-appealing portal that would ensure brand consistency, promote usage, eliminate rogue spend and increase savings by eliminating warehousing costs.

The team developed a balanced scorecard to vet multiple vendors. The scorecard included about 20 weighted questions ranging from cost to production schedules to sustainable practices. They shortlisted three firms and eventually chose ParsonsKellogg (PK). PK then worked with our team to develop a site that reflected Gilbane’s brand and provided employees with products they wanted. With help from the Supply Chain Department, the new e-store was integrated with Gilbane’s existing procurement platform; thereby providing a consistent user interface, streamlined user experience, and efficient tracking.

Each item on the site was hand-selected by our marketing team and we approve all custom orders, ensuring brand consistency. We now have a site that employees want to use – 195 orders in just six months to be exact! Ultimately increasing savings by 21 percent.