Customer Story
Jackson Systems Cuts Review Time From 3 Days to Hours and Frees $1M in Inventory
Overview
A purchasing process that couldn’t keep up
When Thelma Chavez, Director of Operations, joined Jackson Systems, the company had grown from a garage startup into a six-division HVAC distributor with nearly $40M in revenue and a rapidly expanding eCommerce business. The growth was fast which presented opportunities and challenges in their
Business Type
Retail
Industry
HVAC
Solutions
Demand Planning
Connected Planning
LifeLine
Supply Planning
Inventory Optimization / MEIO
Blu GenAI
IBP
Replenishment
Challenges
Two buyers reviewed more than 9,000 SKUs each week using spreadsheets, formulas, and tribal knowledge.
It took two to three days to work through the list, and as soon as they finished, the cycle started over. “We were reviewing every SKU, every week,” Thelma says. “And by the time we finished, it was time to start over.”
There was little visibility into service levels, turns, dormant and dying inventory or ABC velocity code classifications. Supplier deals often guided decisions without clear financial logic. “We had too much inventory on things that weren’t moving and not enough on things that were,” she says.
As eCommerce volume grew and fill-rate expectations tightened, leadership faced a choice: hire another full-time purchasing admin or find a system that could automate the basics and let the team manage by exception. They chose the latter.
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Solutions
Choosing and implementing a new way forward
Blue Ridge had the best interface and analytics you would need as a professional purchasing buyer. Other solutions had pieces, but not the whole package.”
Jackson Systems evaluated three solutions before narrowing to two finalists. Vendors were asked to simulate a “day in the life” using Jackson’s data. That’s where Blue Ridge stood out.
The Blue Ridge platform fit their size and complexity while providing the visibility they lacked and came in at a price point leadership felt would pay for itself in both time and inventory.
Implementation took about six months, drivenlargely bydata cleanup. The Blue Ridge technical guidebook outlined exactly what needed to be sent from their boutique ERP, and Thelma still uses it when something looks off. The transition from implementation toLifeLinesupport was smooth.
“We call ourLifeLinecoach, from time to time,” she says. “There’s always something unique that comes up, and he always has a good solution.”Within months, the workload eased, the manual noisefadedand the team finally had the visibilitythey’dbeen missing.
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Results
Time saved, inventory freed, confidence gained.
98.1%
Service improved from 88% to 98.1%
~$1M
Drop on inventory on hand
The most immediate change was time. What once took two to three days each week shrank to a few focused hours managing exceptions.
“Instead of reviewing every SKU, we were just reviewing the exceptions,” Thelma says. “It was such a relief.” With time freed up, buyers could finally understand why items were trending up or down, prepare for seasonal shifts and spend energy on forward-looking work instead of chasing lists.
What once took days each week, shrank to a few focused hours managing exceptions. “I can do this in like three hours,” she says. “Once we were comfortable managing by exception, what used to take us days turned into a focused, high-confidence review”. Visibility shifted how the business operated.
THe results folLowed:
- Overstock decreased
- Avoided hiring, better sales alignment
- Buying time cut from days to hours
I can load in an event and then next month go back and say, ‘You said we were going to see an uplift of 50%, but we only saw 5%.’ Next year, we’re smarter.”
Leadership saw the connection immediately. “They get excited about the service level and the total inventory dollars,” she says. “Because in turn, all those end up with cash flow.”
Staffing plans changed, too. Jackson Systems had been preparing to add a third buyer, but the efficiency gains eliminated the need. “We were able to avoid the hire completely,” she says. “And that alone pays for the subscription each year.” The team still operates with two buyers, and Thelma believes they can support another 30–40% growth before needing more headcount.
Sales also became more aligned. Initial skepticism gave way to collaboration as they saw how their input shaped planning. They now provide updates on new customer locations, product launches and expected uplifts. “I can load in an event and then next month go back and say, ‘You said we were going to see an uplift of 50%, but we only saw 5%.’ Next year, we’re smarter.”
Trust improved on both sides, sales gained confidence in availability, and purchasing gained better forward-looking information.
I can load in an event and then next month go back and say, ‘You said we were going to see an uplift of 50%, but we only saw 5%.’ Next year, we’re smarter.”
Managing dead stock more strategically
Dead stock hasn’t disappeared, but Jackson Systems now understands why it happens, and where they can influence it. The biggest driver is minimum order quantities: being forced to buy a full case when demand only supports a handful of units each year.
“Most of it comes back to MOQs,” Thelma says. With that visibility, the team can flag problem items earlier and take action. In some cases, it gives them leverage to go back to suppliers, renegotiate minimums, or consolidate buys across locations. In others, it informs smarter decisions about substitutions, stocking strategy, or when to carry an item at all. The result isn’t zero dead stock, but far fewer surprises and much more control.With Blue Ridge, dormant and dying items surface early.
The team now approaches suppliers with data, rebalances inventory where possible and avoids overcommitting on new items. For eCommerce, they test smaller initial buys and review performance quickly. “With the old system, we couldn’t see any of that,” she says. “Now we can.”They’re also exploring alternative sourcing strategies, including partnering with other distributors for slow-moving SKUs.
Looking ahead
A marathon, not a 5K
The Blue Ridge platform forces you to do the analytics, and that develops your team as problem solvers. If you’re leveraging it the right way and really digging into the alerts, it will change how you run your business.”
The team continues to refine seasonal profiles, build custom groups for heating and cooling categories, leverage ABC classifications for both inventory policy and warehouse layout and use analytics to drive continuous improvement.
Two years in, Thelma describes Blue Ridge as a “game changer,” but emphasizes that transformation is ongoing. “It’s a marathon, not a 5K,” she says. “You’ve got to learn and adjust and adapt to the tools and make sure you understand the output.”
Looking ahead, Thelma is excited about the new Blue Ridge platform (Xpression), automatic seasonality assignment, the AI companion“Blu”and eventually maturing into a more formal SIOP/S&OP process.Her advice to others?“The Blue Ridge platform forces you to do the analytics, and that develops your team as problem solvers. Ifyou are leveraging it the right way and really digging into the alerts, it will change how you run your business.”“Blue Ridge has been aGame changer,”she said.
Customer Stories
Hear from the businesses making every decision count
“The ERP handles transactions. Blue Ridge handles the intelligence. That's the difference.”
Brad Smith
SVP, Procurement & Sales
Southwest Traders supplies national restaurant chains – Panera, Einstein, Starbucks, Panda Express – from a buying team of nine to eleven working on an AS/400 ERP. Blue Ridge cut order-build time from days to a few hours, held service levels at 99.95% across blue-chip customers, and let the company onboard new brands without adding to the planning team.
99.95%
Service level across national restaurant brands
~18.5
Days on hand
“Blue Ridge has been the most user-friendly, results-driven system that I've seen so far. Our whole planning and buying team absolutely loves it.”
Stephanie Hunn
Senior Manager, Planning
Before Blue Ridge, ISN was struggling to optimize fill rate and inventory turns simultaneously. The team evaluated multiple vendors and chose Blue Ridge for the onboarding, training, and ongoing system improvements baked into the relationship. They went live and saw measurable results from the first operating cycle forward – with the Strategic Success Practice supporting every step.
~99%
Forecast accuracy maintained
50%
Improvement in fill rates over twelve months
“The goal wasn't just to reduce inventory. It was to have what we need, when we need it. That's exactly what Blue Ridge helped us do.”
David Mays
VP of Operations
West Virginia Electric Supply is an electrical distributor running eight branches on the Eclipse ERP. Centralizing inventory and moving to data-led replenishment let the team strip out the dead stock that had quietly accumulated for years – while service to contractors and customers held above 96% and the planning organization shifted from firefighting to forward-looking decisions.
70–80%
Reduction in dead stock
96.3%
Service level to contractors and customers
"Blue Ridge has the best interface and analytics you would need as a professional purchasing buyer"
Thelma Chavez
Director of Operations
Jackson Systems is a six-division HVAC distributor generating roughly $40M in annual revenue. Before Blue Ridge, the planning team reviewed every SKU manually – a process measured in days, not hours. Exception-based planning compressed that work, freed cash from excess stock, and pushed service levels into a range the team had never sustained before.
~$1M
Drop in inventory on hand
98.1%
Service level, up from 88%
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