From Excel spreadsheets to web portal: connecting teams streamlines operations

American Fence Company has been providing quality fences for over 50 years. Homeowners, contractors, engineers, and architects throughout the Midwest have come to rely on American Fence Company’s breadth of experience and services, and it has grown to become one of the nation’s leading residential and commercial fence contractors.

The Problem

American Fence Company is a successful company with numerous locations across the Midwest. The company has built multiple business lines and engages in hundreds of installation projects annually. American Fence Company had successfully been using Microsoft Excel spreadsheets to organize its work. However, the company’s fast growth was proving hard to scale without a centralized database to track project details.

The Solution

We initiated our discovery process to map out American Fence Company’s new project management system. The objective was to replace the spreadsheets used to track sold projects, schedule upcoming installs, monitor supplies used while on-site, and to collaborate with finance on when projects should be invoiced and commissions paid. Volano built a robust web-based portal that shows each person involved in a project the information they need to work efficiently. This includes important alerts so team members know what needs immediate attention. Project managers can schedule and monitor all projects they oversee at a glance.

The Outcome

The implementation of a centralized database and web portal has worked well for American Fence Company. In fact, it has worked so well that the company has been adding new features and modules to the system. American Fence Company is now working with Volano to extend the database’s function beyond operations to the sales team by adding a mobile estimating system.