During his visit, Xora’s Amir also told me the story of Stock Building Supply.
Stock is the largest supplier of building supplies to professional home builders across the United States. Stock is a long time Xora customer. According to a case study on Xora’s website, the company has used Xora’s software (and Sprint Nextel phones) to achieve one additional truck turn per day, resulting in an additional $50M per year in revenues. Not bad for a deployment that costs about one thousandth of that benefit!
However, the company has been hit hard by the housing downturn. Builders are building fewer new homes, which means Stock has less to deliver. This has resulted in financial losses and thousands of layoffs.
Amidst these challenges, Xora was a bit surprised when Stock decided to expand their deployment of Xora’s workforce management solution. When questioned, Stock simply pointed out that the investment makes perfect sense for tough times. First, it delivers real efficiencies - enabling the company to do the most with the fewest workers. But more importantly, mobility enables the company to be more competitive winning the business that’s still out there to be won.
Sounds like an example many other companies should follow. Capture the power!
—————-
Now playing: Mark Heard - My Redeemer Lives
Mobility is a wonderful thing. As mobility gets built into all products and services, businesses need to learn how to both capture the power of mobility and manage the dangers introduced through mobility. Here are some examples of how the power of mobility is being applied to create competitive advantage:
