Formed in 1977 as J.A Thomas Fuel injection engineers, a purely diesel orientated workshop, The Thomas Group have now grown into a business stocking over 100,000 parts from diesel injection components, auto electrics, petrol injection, air conditioning and OE filtration and fuel additive. With over 250 years of combined workshop experience, Thomas Group sought a business management solution that could cope with all aspects of the business including an extensive e-commerce portfolio that includes Diesel Parts Direct (DPD), Delphi Parts store (DPS), and Vehicle Parts Market (VPM), along with Amazon/Ebay integration, and combine this knowledge and help unlock its full potential.
After trying other business management systems over many years, Thomas Group began discussion with MAM Software. Kevin O’Sullivan, Director of Thomas Group identified “MAM Software to be synonymous with the Automotive industry, buying groups and factoring. We were down a blind alley with our current solution, we needed to sit down and have a technical discussion with someone about what we wanted from our business management system, what could be achieved and where we want the company to be heading, and that is where the discussion with Ben began.” Ben Nicholls, Automotive Sales Manager met with Kevin and the other directors of Thomas Group to discuss the software available to them and the many benefits of being a customer of MAM Software. After exploring all options followed by a team visit to the MAM offices in Barnsley, Thomas Group decided that Autopart is the way forward for them.
Autopart is the versatile business management software that seamlessly integrates sales, stock management, accounting and reporting processes in one easy-to-use package. Kevin added “Autopart is what we needed, it was a software that could do what other business management systems simply couldn’t. MAM’s workshop management tool QJI was also implemented, adding further capability to our diesel/garage workshops. We are now live on the system, absolutely everybody is very complimentary about the product, especially how quick and easy it is to use. Now we have become familiar with the essentials we have booked training to learn all the extra processes and reporting that can really help elevate our day-to-day activities.”
Kevin has put the success of the implementation down to a number of different factors. “I feel that things have gone so smoothly due to two great teams working together as a partnership to get the best out of our business and Autopart. Our team has really stepped up and performed and it’s great to see that if any of them raised a query or potential issue we have a single person from MAM who spoke to us and resolved the issue very quickly” supported by management in the background.
Kevin commented that another huge positive and perfect timing was the Konnect customer conference held in Stratford upon Avon in early March, “a superb event with the opportunity to network with many MAM customers, attend technical seminars and book 1-2-1 technical sessions.”
Looking to the future, Kevin concluded “We have a roadmap of where we need to go, and we need the right technology to do that. I’ve been speaking closely to Ben and Teccom ordering is something we will require. We are also interested in adding Autocat into our business to accommodate our parts cataloguing needs. Moving over to a new software is always going to have some problems, but the important part is having a team that can swiftly resolve these and that’s what MAM have achieved.”
Ben Nicholls added “I was involved from the very beginning with Thomas Group so it’s great to see that they are now live and getting the most they can out of Autopart and MAM Software. It’s a great team down there who have some high aspirations of where they want to take the business. I’m confident that they can achieve this and Autopart has an essential role to play.”
