Customers

Johnson Outdoors

Johnson Outdoors logo "We achieved everything with the Business Objects implementation that we set out to accomplish—we have empowered users to be self-sufficient, we've offloaded the live production systems to enable them to perform appropriately, and we've lowered the costs of generating the reports. People now have faith in the timeliness and accuracy of data that they use to make critical business decisions."

Ron Hamilton
Director of Business Solutions
Johnson Outdoors

Challenge

Founded over 30 years ago, Wisconsin-based Johnson Outdoors is a leading provider of innovative, top-quality recreational products specifically designed for people with a passion for the great outdoors. Johnson Outdoors is responsible for many brands that are commonplace names for open-air enthusiasts, including Ocean Kayak, Carlisle Paddles, MinnKota trolling motors, Humminbird Fishfinders, Scubapro diving products, and Eureka! tents.

Despite being an innovator and visionary in the world of outdoor recreation, the company's legacy data systems didn't quite measure up to the standards set by its own products. Ron Hamilton, director of business solutions at Johnson Outdoors, elaborates, "Our old reporting application was directly connected to our live systems, with zero replication of data. The problem was that when users tried to run ad hoc reports, they would frequently cause everything to lock up. This resulted in significant data integrity issues with the processing of transactions."

This untenable situation clearly had to be addressed, so Hamilton, a business intelligence (BI) industry veteran, crafted a set of requirements for a solution. Any new reporting system would have to impose nominal overhead on the live operational applications, but at the same time, it needed to present data that accurately portrayed the actual state of the business at any given moment. Additionally, the solution had to empower business users to feel confident enough to become self-sufficient in creating custom reports. Hamilton reflects, "Because our businesses are so dynamic, the demands for tailored reports also share the same volatility. My team was constantly being asked to create new reports and amendments to existing routines. It was imperative that any replacement solution be very simple to understand and easily manipulated by our business users."

The new solution had to be deployed quickly and during the off-season. Hamilton explains, "As a seasonal company, we didn't want to impact business during our peak season. However, it was imperative that we implement a new solution as soon as possible because the legacy system was causing too many problems to the manufacturing process."

Approach

Drawing on his extensive BI experience, Hamilton selected from the comprehensive BI portfolio of Business Objects, an SAP company, to address the company's needs. He recalls, "Our design centered on the deployment of two industry-leading Business Objects solutions— BusinessObjects™ Data Integrator and BusinessObjects Web Intelligence® XI Release 2. My faith in Business Objects is so high that I literally stood up in front of the chairman of the board and said, 'I guarantee that this will work'—that's how confident I was!"

Because of the extremely small window available for deployment before the onslaught of the company's peak season, Johnson Outdoors called on the services of Andrews Consulting Group, a Business Objects Platinum Partner, for implementation assistance. Hamilton notes, "Having worked with Andrews Consulting Group in the past, I knew they can be relied on to deliver exactly what they say they will deliver, within the agreed-to timeframe—and they did. We have every major business function now immediately accessible within the BusinessObjects environment. Our business users range from customer service managers, running and reviewing daily sales reports, to financial controllers, who analyze spending trends from our General Ledger reporting mart."

In addition to BusinessObjects Data Integrator and BusinessObjects Web Intelligence, which is used for Web-based query and reporting, Johnson Outdoors uses the BusinessObjects XI BI platform, BusinessObjects Desktop Intelligence™ for query and analysis, Xcelsius® for dashboarding and visualization, and Auditing, an add-on to BusinessObjects XI.

Results

Because Johnson Outdoors is structured around autonomous business units, business rule intelligence was integrated into each of its 12 universes. By defining which order types make up sales reporting, the BI team was able to incorporate into the sales mart predefined filters that are reusable by all reports and users. These predefined filters add consistency in reporting, resulting in accurate data query results. Commenting on the improvements, Hamilton says, "Now when we run a consolidated report, we get a real 'apples-to-apples' comparison—we have eradicated the inconsistencies that were due to subtly different data definitions between businesses. The accuracy of the information the company uses to manage the overall business has increased phenomenally."

With four major business units spread across the United States in 10 different locations, the Web-based interface makes it easy to support remote users from a centralized location. The process of integrating newly acquired business entities has also been streamlined. Hamilton explains, "Anytime we roll in a new business unit, from day one they immediately have access to predefined reports. This is a huge benefit, especially when converting users from one ERP system to another. Instead of having to develop reports from scratch, they get access to information right away—on day one—cutting out several days and sometimes weeks of repetitive development time." He adds, "I really like the tiny footprint of BusinessObjects Web Intelligence—it enables us to minimize our support costs by centrally supporting multiple plant locations around the U.S. and Canada."

In the 15 months since implementation, in addition to using the library of 300 stock reports built up over that time, the 150 Johnson Outdoors users have generated 40,000 ad hoc queries—the majority without directly involving the BI team. While most users run predefined reports, Johnson Outdoors also has power users—mostly analytical users within each business function—who define reports according to their own business reporting needs and are able to develop an entire monthly business process around fiscal reporting time periods. The use of these reports aids in the ongoing daily processes of sourcing, manufacturing, selling, distributing, and collecting revenue for Johnson Outdoors.

"We achieved everything with the Business Objects implementation that we set out to accomplish—we have empowered users to be self-sufficient, we've offloaded the live production systems to enable them to perform appropriately, and we've lowered the costs of generating the reports," Hamilton concludes. "People now have faith in the timeliness and accuracy of data that they use to make critical business decisions. The Business Objects solution delivered exactly what it promised to do, and our business users recognize the implementation to be an unqualified success. In fact, I've had zero complaints from my users—when they're happy, I'm happy!"

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