Charterhouse Holdings plc was founded in 1970. The company has a rich history in garment manufacture, initially supplying some of the biggest names on the High Street and producing licensed merchandise for the likes of the NFL and The Simpsons.
Charterhouse has changed significantly over 48 years and today operates as three exceptionally successful brands: Kustom Kit, Xpres and Vanilla.
This portfolio of brands delivers quality products in the personalised clothing sector, visual communications industry and garment retail.
Streamlining to one platform
The continued growth of the Charterhouse brands had led to a patchwork of systems used across the business, as Mark Bartlett, Chief Finance and IT Officer at Charterhouse Holdings plc, explains: “We’d got to the point where we’d got 13 or 14 legacy systems.”
The Charterhouse team knew there was significant potential to drive efficiency and improve sales and marketing by streamlining the existing business systems.
Bartlett says, “We wanted a solution to give us a single platform for sales, marketing, finance, and operations. Dynamics 365 was the best fit for our business needs.”
More meaningful marketing
Charterhouse started rolling out Dynamics 365 in the autumn of 2019, beginning with the sales and marketing functions. Marketing Director Ryan Hornbuckle says his team are already putting more meaningful campaigns together.
Miles Carter, CEO at Charterhouse Holdings plc, summarises the improvements: “We’re able to get much, much better targeting. The guys can analyse the information that is going in, and they can trust that information.”
Flexibility brings resilience
In March 2020, Charterhouse began rolling out the next phase of its Dynamics 365 project: going live with finance and operations functions. The go-live couldn’t have come at a better time: within weeks, the company locked down ahead of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Sharon Dewsbury, Merchandise Manager at Charterhouse, explains, “At present, the fact that we’re able to work from home is something that we wouldn’t have been able to achieve before… we didn’t have this live system where everyone could access live data.”
Bartlett agrees, “I think the return to normal office working is going to be, perhaps, some time away. But it does mean that we can bring people back to work and flex this working-from-home capability we now have.”
Driving efficiency with Dynamics 365
Charterhouse already sees efficiencies in its operations, and staff love the new, integrated view of business information. Staff report a reduction in paper flow and improvements in the time spent on tasks. The ability to personalise dashboard views is highly valued.
Dewsbury says, “The fact that we can now communicate on one platform with ease… yes, it would be difficult to return.”