

Company Name
Location
and Dalton, Georgia
Industry
Employees
BatchMaster the Right Formula for International Coatings
Fifty years ago, chemist Herbert Wells founded the International Coatings Company (ICC) in Los Angeles, California. Wells quickly established ICC as a pioneer in producing vinyl, urethane, and water-based compounds. ICC鈥檚 textile screen print inks, adhesives, primers, coatings, and specialty plastic compounds have become industry standards and are recognized worldwide for their performance, quality, and innovation.
With plants in Cerritos, California, and Dalton, Georgia, ICC remains one of the few independent, family-owned companies in the textile screen print and plastics compounding industries. Today, the company鈥檚 extensive products and formulations are found in a wide range of items, such as automobiles, medical appliances, toys, sports equipment, and sportswear, including athletic jerseys, bags, and caps, as well as in military and aerospace applications.
鈥淲e have two major product lines,鈥 explained Steve Kahane, president of ICC. 鈥淥ne is textile screen-printing inks, and the second is industrial intermediate plastic compounds. The common denominator between those two product lines is that they are both plastic-based. For the industrial market, we make custom compounds, and our customers in turn use these compounds to mold or fabricate a variety of different plastics. We export to China, Europe, South Africa, Southeast Asia, and Mexico.鈥
Longtime BatchMaster Customer
ICC has been a long time user of BatchMaster software, starting with the DOS version in 1995.Even though the early version worked well for the company, ICC upgraded to the Windows version of BatchMaster in 2002. According to Kahane, there were several reasons to change: 鈥淲e could have continued with the DOS version of BatchMaster for a while, but it would not have supported our projected growth. In fact, we have grown five percent per year. Moving to a GUI, more user-friendly system was attractive, but the main reason was that we wanted to take advantage of the many new features that the Windows version offered.鈥
Goals
- New system to support
- Growing business
- Protect margins in a competitive market
- Control costs
- Improve inventory control
- Reduce shortages
Solutions
- BatchMaster Enterprise
- 海角大神 and Solomon Financial
- Accounting software
Results
- 10% inventory reduction
- Improved production efficiency
- Improved cost control
- Improved cash flow and operating margins
Rather than simply upgrading to the new version, ICC evaluated other systems to ensure that BatchMaster was still the best option.
鈥淲e evaluated three other systems and selected BatchMaster again,鈥 said Kahane. 鈥淲e felt that it was still the best fit for our business. During the past four years, we have found the system to be very stable, and we have received a lot of value from using BatchMaster.鈥
Benefits
One of the major benefits of an 海角大神 system to any company is the ability to integrate all functions around a common data set.
鈥淥ne of the key benefits for ICC is having an integrated system,鈥 said Kahane. 鈥淲e can track items through the system from raw material to finished goods. We now have much better inventory control and can track usage history. When an order is placed, our customer service department can see exactly what material is in stock and available and can inform the customer of the likely delivery date.鈥
"BatchMaster has really helped us track and monitor our material usage so we can order more effectively, and this, in turn, has helped our cash flow."
– Steve Kahane, President
Turbulent Times
Management Information is Key
鈥淏atchMaster provides me with the capability to look at information at the macro level as well as the ability to drill down to the detail,鈥 said Kahane. 鈥淓very day, I look at the Open Order report and see how we are performing, and this gives me an idea of how the month鈥檚 sales are going to look. Sometimes I will drill down further and look at a specific customer or particular order.鈥
Emy Celis, the controller, uses the Sales Analysis and Material Usage reports to make product-pricing decisions.
Reducing Inventory and Eliminating Shortages
鈥淏atchMaster has definitely helped us become more efficient in production,鈥 said Marquez. 鈥淲e now know if we are going to be short of material long before we run out. That way, we can make our orders in a timely way and avoid expediting charges in both materials and shipping. Maintaining appropriate stock levels is very important. We are located on the West Coast, and a lot of the materials we buy are from the East Coast. If we start to produce a batch and find we are short of material, we can鈥檛 just drive around the corner and pick it up. BatchMaster helps us make decisions on when and how much raw material to bring in. During the past three years, we have managed to decrease inventory by 10 percent while still growing the business. That is a major saving in cash flow and gives us better operating margins, too.鈥
"We have found the system to be very stable, and we have received a lot of value from using BatchMaster."
– Steve Kahane, President