Database developers don't get no respect. Over the past 20 years,
Steven Barer, of local database development firm Oak Bay Softrends in Vancouver,
British Columbia, Canada, has built customized software based on the
FileMaker Pro database.
However, he has received little public recognition for this sort of
behind-the-scenes work that can change the way small to mid-sized
businesses function.
Barer understands that custom database development is "not a glitzy
business," but he contends that it can be "an integral part of the
success of and, often a competitive edge for, many successful
companies."
One of Oak Bay's clients, M&R
Environmental in Burnaby, BC, began collecting plastic oil
containers for recycling in 1994 with four employees and a single
truck. At the time, it tracked customers and scheduled pickups using
recipe cards. Now with a staff of 50, the company manages a fleet of 15
trucks.
Quickly outgrowing the recipe cards, it looked for off-the-shelf
scheduling software. Finding nothing that seemed to do what it needed,
M&R turned to Oak Bay in 1996. What it got started out as "a simple
scheduling program," according to company controller Dani Mate, but "it
was flexible enough that we could add in new functionality as it became
necessary." Now, several rewrites later, she said "everything we do
lives in this program."
Along with scheduling pickups and deliveries, it now keeps inventory
of what has grown from one to 319 products: recycled antifreeze,
plastics, oil, and more. A bridge to M&R's accounting software
allows the company to invoice its more than 5,000 customers and to
provide Mate with "information at my fingertips" as required.
M&R's FileMaker-based software evolved as the company grew; both
Barer and Mate note that this required a close working relationship
where Oak Bay had to learn about M&R's business and M&R had to
learn about the capabilities of FileMaker. Along the way, Mate became
an unofficial co-developer of her company's customized software. Now
she feels she "can call and ask for changes and know that they can
happen."
Company president George Mate noted that, while the initial costs
seemed high for a struggling young business, "from day one, the
software has been expandable."
He agreed that the collaboration between Barer and his wife has been
"vital" to allowing the software to be customized to meet M&R's
needs.
For M&R, the big test in the ability to modify the software came
on July 1, 2003, when new regulations for the waste oil collection
industry involved paperwork, invoicing and accounting. On that day, it
was the only company in BC with processes in place for the
change-over.
New releases of the core FileMaker product have brought new
capabilities to M&R's custom solution. Now, for instance, it can
export from the database to spreadsheets and use colour coding to make
it easier to recognize different product types or other data
categories.
Also new: sales reps can access product inventory and other
information from their iPhones.
In total, 20 M&R employees involved in sales, scheduling, and
invoicing have varying levels of access to the database.
George Mate suggests that, compared with his competitors, M&R
has more effective software that has been able to evolve with the
company's vision.
Added Dani Mate: "There's nobody in the industry that does what we
do in terms of our data. Nobody. It's pretty impressive to be able to
say to a client, here's a complete report of everything we've done for
you, down to how many litres of waste oil we hauled away on
Tuesday."
By opting for a customized database and by learning to work with the
software developers, M&R has gotten software that fits its needs
and that evolves as those needs grow and change. Concluded Dani Mate,
"It allows us to be more nimble than our competitors."
