Epicor Joins ElectricalTrends

ElectricalTrends would like to welcome Epicor as our latest advertiser.

Epicor, as many in the electrical industry knows, is a prominent ERP system in the electrical industry. In fact, according to Electrical Wholesaling, more than 70 of the Top 200 electrical distributors in the US run their business on Eclipse, Epicor’s electrical package.

Years ago, I recall working with a distributor who was evaluating ERP systems.  Mind you, I was not involved in the evaluation process.  The distributor was mid-sized, in the $25-50M range.  They looked at some industry packages as well as packages that were seeking to enter into the electrical market.  I recall commenting to them, “why risk going to a non-industry package at your size? You don’t have the personnel expertise to keep a system current with industry initiatives and industry packages have the functionality that you need.  The difference is in how you use the information (and nowadays metrics / analytics) that are resident in the system.” The ended up selecting Eclipse.

Since then ERP capabilities have expanded as distributor needs have grown.  Yes, they are not always perfect (and hence why there are bolt-ons for dashboards, CRM, SFA, marketing automation, eCommerce and more) but they are critical to the success of a distributorship.

Effective use of an ERP system is integral to achieving distributor profitability. As operating costs continue to rise and net profit remains low, it is important for distributors to maximize utilization of their ERP systems to increase their throughput and maximize their productivity.  Additionally, unlocking the insights from the information that is within an ERP system is important to gain customer insights as well as operational insights. Effective aggregation and analysis of data can help identify areas to accelerate growth as well as improve profitability while enhancing customer service.

Epicor is an important player in the industry and we look forward to partnering with them to continue to share insights via ElectricalTrends and hope to work with them on upcoming important industry initiatives in the near future.