In my last post, I highlighted a former Sage customer who moved to Microsoft Dynamics GP that achieved some great results. Today I wanted to blog about a former QuickBooks customer, Gregory Greenfield & Associates, Ltd. (GG&A), who not only made the move to Dynamics GP, but who also chose to deploy the system in a hosted environment.  What might sound like quite a lot of change for any company to undertake was handled with ease and great results by GG&A and their local Dynamics GP Partner.

You can read the full case study here, but I’ll recap the important facts of this great story:

• As of early 2009, GG&A manages 22 regional retail property investments on behalf of a mix of institutional and private investment groups.  Imagine having not one boss to report to, but TWENTY-TWO different “bosses” you need to please! While the case study touches on this only slightly, I would bet that the reporting needs for each one of these investment groups is quite different making for a pretty complex set of requirements that GG&A is able to meet utilizing the great reporting and BI tools available with Dynamics GP.
• The reason they chose to deploy GP in a hosted environment rather than on-premises was quite simply the lower costs and “maintenance free” aspect of the model. They enjoy not having to worry about buying or maintaining equipment, and like that the software can be automatically updated overnight without any downtime or extra planning on their part.  My favorite quote in the case study comes from GG&A’s CFO, Bill Brown: “In our experience so far, the hosted solution has worked as advertised. Microsoft Dynamics in a hosted setup makes great sense for a growing or midmarket company looking to acquire a top-notch business system. It offers a low cost of entry with predictable IT costs.”  However, GG&A also noted they very much appreciate the fact that if their business needs change down the road, they can always take control of their Dynamics GP install and bring it in-house.  That is the “power of choice” that sets Microsoft Dynamics apart from other pure on-premises or hosted solutions.
• So I lied…I actually have two favorite quotes from this case study.  The second comes from their Controller, Jackie Young, when she says “We went from the old way of doing things, which was about 10 percent automated, to the new way with Microsoft Dynamics GP, which is about 90 percent or 95 percent automated. It’s freed us to focus less on clerical tasks and to spend more time doing things that are really valuable.”  For example, GG&A stated that each of the seven people working in the accounting department each spends an estimated 20 hours less per month preparing investor reports!

I think this case study is a great testament to the flexibility and productivity enhancing capabilities of Microsoft Dynamics GP.  The ability to host Dynamics GP or deploy it on-premises is a great option for customers, and the ability to automate many tasks can save customers a ton of time and money.  While many people expect it to be hard to please a former QuickBooks customer when they move on to any ERP designed for mid-market customers, but GG&A proved that making the move to Microsoft Dynamics GP is the Smart Move!

AndyW