Founded in 1990, Midwest Rake Company of Warsaw , Indiana started business with four rake models: the Landscape rake, Asphalt Lute, Construction rake and an aluminum Sandtrap rake. The company has expanded its product line to over 50 products in seven areas that include "Accuform" golf maintenance tools, landscaping tools, tennis court maintenance tools, asphalt maintenance tools and construction maintenance tools.

Midwest Rake had been using ACT! contact management database and MAS 90 for its accounting system. There was no linkage between the two databases. They needed to be able to track contact information and have direct interface with their MAS 90 accounting system. Equally important was the ability to broadcast fax and mass mail to a filtered target audience. Midwest Rake decided to purchase Sages' Enterprise Edition CRM software and Micronique's CRM Link for MAS 90 middleware.

Several departments have taken advantage of the new system including customer service, marketing, inventory, and accounting. Midwest experienced benefits quickly. Micronique's CRM Link has proven to be an asset to Customer Service. Having customer contact records, sales records and inventory records integrated makes for a quicker response time when on the phone with a customer. The customer service representative can quickly pull up a customer's record in The CRM software and quickly look up a Sales Order or Inventory record. Micronique's CRM Link makes adding new customers a snap. Said David Coppes, Customer Service and Marketing Manager for Midwest Rake, "As our contacts become customers we can bring their data already in The CRM software right into MAS 90 on the fly with Micronique's CRM Link."

Midwest Rake was able to expand mailing programs and follow up by a targeted, filtered fax, targeting by dealer, distributor, retail, or by geographic area. Soon after the installation of The CRM software and Micronique's CRM Link, Midwest was able to import a database from a disk acquired at a trade show and import it directly into its database. "It's great bringing a disk from a trade show and downloading it directly into the system. From there, I filtered that list into three targeted mass mailings," said David Coppes. "I used to put hours into a job like this, but now I can get it done in minutes. I did a mailing to 1000 customers in Florida . I was able to follow it up with 100 to 200 targeted faxes per night."

Now that Midwest Rake has a complete information solution with Micronique's CRM Link connecting their CRM software and MAS 90 databases, the company can look forward to greater efficiency, better customer service and reduced operating costs. As Midwest continues to grow its business, this efficiency will become an even greater asset.