Expense Reduction Analysts cut $45,000 from luxurious Lalique’s shipping bill

Over the years, Lalique has built up a reputation for fine crystal and luxury giftware, and today they ship their wares to customers throughout North America. Understandably, fine items like these require a delicate touch, and that in turn attracts significant freight costs.

Lalique’s CFO, Badr Benabdessadek, and Director of Operations George Bonifacio were both keen to find a way to cut back on the $250,000 they were spending on shipping costs each year – without compromising careful handling or on-time delivery.

Richard Halperin of Expense Reduction Analysts agreed that staying with the same freight company was a wise idea based on the current state of systems integration, and the desire to avoid additional integration costs.

That meant that more advantageous contractual terms would need to be secured in order to cut back costs.

“When I first came to Lalique, Badr and George told me they were more than happy with their incumbent, but wanted an independent assessment that might show them way they could reduce the costs involved,” Richard said.

During that assessment, he quickly determined that, should a change prove the best course of action, there would be a significant operations issue concerning integration of new shipping software with Lalique’s accounting and warehousing systems.

“After analyzing the data and testing a competing carrier, I was able to negotiate more advantageous contractual terms with the incumbent,” Richard recalls. “At the same time, I managed to find a way to avoid any additional costs associated with new software installation and integration.”

As an additional benefit, Lalique implemented electronic invoicing, which streamlined and simplified the invoicing and reconciliation process. It also ended manual data processing, and gives access to a wealth of additional shipping information for further analysis and fast reporting.

Thanks to Richard, Lalique now enjoys a savings of $45,000 annually in ground shipping costs and receives on-going support provided by ERA – a result that Badr and George are deeply pleased with.

Together, Lalique and ERA plan to continue monitoring the carrier’s shipping performance over the next 18 months, with Lalique to enjoy the 18% savings generated by this project.

source : ERA