Napoleon
Competing toe-to-toe with some of the largest retail distributors on the globe, Napoleon deploy Optimizely B2B Commerce Cloud to boolster digital experiences for their dealer network
Building an iconic ecommerce platform, for an iconic brand
The Napoleon brand is truly iconic in the world of BBQ grills and outdoor living. Steeped in history, the roots and story behind this company hail back some 44 years to its origins, a migrated couple called Wolfgang and Ingrid Schroeter living in Canada. The pair, in pursuit of excellence, began making wood stoves for friends which turned into one of North America's fastest growing privately owned Grill and Fireplaces manufacturers with an extensive dealer network reaching over 50 countries.
Napolean wanted a cloud-based solution to create an online channel for its dealer network. The online channel needed to give dealers access to key product information and availability and up to the minute insights into the status of current orders and overall account activity. The solution would be accessible from the retail floor or HQ 24/7 and both mobile and tablet responsive.
Napoleon chose to work with Optimizely (formerly known as Episerver) to rollout the B2B Commerce Cloud solution across its business. The major advantages being a constantly evolving and improving cloud-based solution rich with features that free up time for internal staff and make the order processing and stock availability slick and easy to handle.
The opportunity to augment its ability to serve customers
The business serve a large gas distributor network comprising of various levels of gas professionals in North America and Europe. In addition to selling via this channel, Napoleon also sell into large retailers - what they call the ''Big Box Channel''. It's not only the showpiece BBQs sold either. The offering extends to installation products including fireplaces and furnaces.
The dealer network is able to confidently sell more and a wider range of products due to the seamless digital experience B2B Commerce Cloud offers. Taking the offline business fully online has eliminated email and fax orders and reduced telephone orders via the call centre by almost half. The dealer network has found it accelerates sales and shortens lead times plus puts the power back in the customers’ hands by having real time information at hand, at the point of purchase. Service levels and customer satisfaction have seen an increase due to more value-added work being carried out by the sales teams across the Napoleon and dealer network users.
Safe in the knowledge that the ROI payback of the B2B Commerce Cloud solution has been realised within 8 months of using the technology, Napoleon is looking at ways of further incorporating cloud-based technology into its systems and future road map. The future technology will all be aimed at ensuring Napoleon puts the customer at the heart of its processes and continues in the words of the team at Napoleon “to delight” its customers.
Four years’ ago we had 17 different unmanaged sales sites that have now been streamlined into one single platform. It’s changed the way the business operates and we now offer a seamless digital experience for the entire network of dealers and our own internal staff. Episerver / Optimizely has been an integral partner in making this happen and we very much look forward to working closely with the team to further improve upon our offering in the next four years.
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Jean-Louis Marin
Vice President Information Technology Napoleon, Wolf Steel Ltd
Project Facts
See the result at www.napoleon.com
In collaboration with
Absolunet Inc.
Absolunet is an Epi Platinum Solution Partner after a number of highly successful B2B eCommerce projects.
Absolunet has:
- 20 years of happy customers
- A full eCommerce service offering (strategy, PIM, B2B, B2C, marketing)
- 2 EPI-certified CMS and 12 Insite-certified developers
- 15+ successful Episerver B2B Commerce Cloud (formerly Insite) projects
“Simply put, Absolunet really, really understands B2B and how to use eCommerce to address the needs of manufacturers and distributors. I can’t overstate how critical this is to our partnership.”
- Steve Shaffer, Former CEO, Insite Software
