Johnston’s

Background

Based in Chilliwack, BC, Johnston’s has been offering custom processing services since 1928. Johnston’s remains a family-owned business but now employs and supports over 120 families in the Fraser Valley. As a provincial plant, they supply the Fraser Valley with high-quality RWA pork products and are the top source for quality products from BC producers.

Challenges Due to Inefficient, Manual Processes

Johnston’s had a couple of challenges that Kwixand Solutions helped to address. The first challenge was the lack of visibility into how the company was performing. Done mostly on Excel, their reporting was not streamlined, and it often took hours. “It used to take me a lot of time to create my own excel sheets and gather data from different places to be able to get the management reports ready,” says Cornell Lazurca, Johnston's Plant Manager.

Their second pressing challenge was their process of requesting work orders. Since they’re in the food industry, Johnston’s must regularly maintain their machinery and track the work order history to show inspectors. Previously, they had an informal manual system where they would request a work order via a paper document which would be handed to the maintenance staff. This meant that it was not easy to raise a work order nor was there a process for tracking these orders and maintenance records.

Improving Decision-Making & Visibility with Microsoft Power BI

To streamline reporting, Kwixand Solutions integrated Microsoft Power BI for Johnston's. We helped them leverage their existing ERP system to gain visibility into their historical data, such as pricing information, customer sales history, etc. As prices constantly fluctuate in their industry, they can now compare and track past pricing and even drill down into a specific customer to see order history, sales, and pricing history - all of which they were unable to achieve easily through Excel alone.

This enabled them to make decisions based by data instead of relying solely on their instincts and experience. We also helped them significantly reduce the time spent on reporting. "I used to spend two, three hours each day, collecting all the data to put together to get a report," says Cornell Lazurca, Johnston's Plant Manager. "Now I can get reports with a click of a button. I can also easily track sales reports and monitor who is buying what at what price. It really helped me to see where we are at every single day."

Streamlining & Tracking Work Order Requests with a Custom Power App

To formalize and create an efficient system of requesting and tracking work orders, Kwixand Solutions designed and implemented a custom app. It allowed their staff to easily raise a request for a work order, which gets automatically logged in the system. This created visibility for the maintenance team as all the open work order requests were now in one centralized location and could prioritize requests and allocate their staff efficiently. After a request is executed, it gets tracked in the app. They are also able to record feedback and future recommendations in the app. For instance, making a note about future maintenance that might be needed on certain machinery, based on what they currently observed. Keeping a record of past maintenance work orders and easily tracking what needs to be done has made it easier for them to share the required information during inspections.

Client-First Approach to Solutions

Cornell was appreciative of Kwixand Solutions' commitment to providing value and client-centric approach. "Other IT consultancies that I met with suggested their solution, with the understanding that we would have to adapt to their solution. But Kwixand Solutions came in, saw what we did, and offered suggestions on how they would adapt their solution to our needs," says Cornell, adding that he whole-heartedly recommends Kwixand to other similar businesses. He adds, "The reason I recommend them is that I know that the solution that they will offer will be an honest one and will help your business long-term. They never try to push something you don't need."