commissary INSIDER - October 2017 - 12

Tech:

TrueCommerce EDI
helps King's Hawaiian

"Most of our larger customers
generate EDI orders, so manual
orders aren't an option, As a
business trying to keep up in
the industry, integrated EDI is
just something you need to do."
Ann Harper, King's Hawaiian's customer
service manager

by Andy Nelson

pany even got the chance to enter a float
in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
(The three-story concoction included a
volcano that erupted confetti.)

King's Hawaiian buns have been featured prominently in products sold at
fast food giant Arby's. In 2016, the com-

But according to King's Hawaiian officials, the company wouldn't be near
the success story it is today without
the quiet, behind-the-scenes work
of a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based
software company, TrueCommerce.

ing's Hawaiian is renowned in
the bakery category for its highquality Hawaiian Sweet rolls,
bread and buns. Products from the
Torrance, Calif.-based company have
long been a staple of in-store bakeries
throughout the U.S.

TrueCommerce supplies King's Hawaiian with the Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) platform it uses to
handle the high-order volume and
diverse procurement requirements of
Amazon and other retailers, including many leading grocers, says Ann
Harper, King's Hawaiian's customer
service manager.
True Commerce's system helps improve
the speed, efficiency and accuracy of
King Hawaiian's substantial EDI order
volume, Harper says - while also supporting the mandated procurement requirements of some of the world's largest retailers and food stores.
Without it, Harper thinks King's Hawaiian would not only lose the great majority of its order volume - it would
also need to hire two more customer
service staff to manually process the
remaining orders.

KING'S HAWAIIAN IS USING TRUE COMMERCE EDI
TO HANDLE HIGH-ORDER VOLUME AND DIVERSE
PROCUREMENT REQUIREMENTS.
PHOTO: KING'S HAWAIIAN

12 * OCTOBER 2017

"We use TrueCommerce as our valueadded network provider, and we use
the TrueCommerce Transaction Manager software to receive EDI orders
from trading partners, validate that
they are complete and correct, and
then export the data into our ERP,"
says Harper.

commissary INSIDER

What distinguishes TrueCommerce's
EDI system, according to Haitham
Ghadiry, TrueCommerce's vice president of sales and marketing, is robust
EDI integration with Sage 500 that automates the flow of data between systems. With TrueCommerce, he says, no
rekeying is required, which saves time
and minimizes mistakes.
That's crucial for King's Hawaiian,
which processes several hundred orders a day via EDI from major retail and
grocery chains including Walmart, Target, and ShopRite, Harper says.
"The data passes in and out of our ERP
system automatically, so accuracy is
maintained vs. if someone had to rekey
it all as a manual process and potentially make an error."
In today's high-tech marketplace, Harper says, EDI is a must. About 85 percent
of King's Hawaiian customers use EDI.
And of those, close to half require it.
"Most of our larger customers generate EDI orders, so manual orders aren't
an option," Harper says. "As a business
trying to keep up in the industry, integrated EDI is just something you need
to do."

Brand-strengthening
through e-commerce
Cutting-edge EDI isn't the only way
TrueCommerce helps King's Hawaiian
keep its top position in the market.
The software company's Nexternal eCommerce Platform provides King's Hawaiian with a high-quality, customer-friendly
and easy-to-maintain web retail presence,
says Connie Linehan, general manager of
King's Hawaiian's online store.

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of commissary INSIDER - October 2017