Audubon Supply personifies the old-school focus and customer-service achievements of a long-standing, family-run organization in business for more than a century. Now in its fourth generation of being family-owned and operated, the business started in 1913 as a quality provider of plumbing products in New Jersey. In the years following, the company has expanded to three locations in southern New Jersey. Its main office is in Audubon, New Jersey (founded in 1913 by Albert Knoettner). This was followed with the first branch location opening in Mantua, New Jersey in 1998 and a second branch opening in 2013 in Cape May Court House, New Jersey.
All three locations provide plumbing, heating, air conditioning and ductwork materials as well as two fully equipped sheet-metal fabrication shops. The first shop is at the main office in Audubon, and the second is at the branch location in Mantua. Audubon Supply counts as its customer base for a lot of contractors who run family-based companies. From its inception, Audubon Supply has prided itself on the strength of its communication with its customers. This started with the company’s founding in 1913 and has evolved as the com-munication styles have evolved over the decades. Regardless of the communication medium, Audubon Supply centers all communication around a personal family touch that keeps the customers engaged.
As with any business with multiple locations and a customer base that is largely on the road, effective business-to-customer communication is a priority, especially given that contractors typically know the products/parts that they want and don’t have time to browse in a store. Audubon Supply realized that technology could enhance their communication efforts and first undertook an email campaign for promotions, company updates and customer communication.
“We tried email and different platforms for years to connect with customers,” said Brian Murphy, general manager at Audubon Supply. “We did not get a good return and had a hard time to get customers to open emails.”
Murphy then moved to explore mobile marketing to reach his customers. And, at this point in time, mobile makes the most sense.
According to Pew Research, in 2019, the vast majority of Americans (96%) own a cellphone of some kind. With almost all cell phones, SMS communication is enabled and easier to use, given that the SMS channel does not require internet connection. When this cell phone ubiquity is combined with the fact that SMS promotions have a 98% read rate (versus 20% for email), text promotions made sense for Audubon Supply.
Murphy met with mobile marketing platform provider Moblico and liked the company’s approach to marketing and the down-to-earth company culture, which mirrored that of Audubon Supply. The company implemented Moblico’s Toolbox2Go, a mobile app designed for distributors that allows customer communication and ordering via a mobile app. In addition, Toolbox 2Go gives customers and employees the ability to communicate and engage with text and push messaging. Audubon Supply implemented Moblico’s Toolbox-2Go across all three of its locations.
“The setup and training were especially easy,” said Murphy. “Moblico had the system running quickly, and it took only half an hour to train all of our customer service and sales representatives.”
The promotional and customer-to-business communication began immediately. Audubon Supply does a text push each Monday with weekly specials, and then uses the text channel to update customers of store hours during holidays and other time-sensitive announcements. The company noticed an almost immediate positive response to their promotions from customers compared with the email programs.
In addition, the Moblico solution has provided an important customer communication channel to the business. Customers can text Audubon Supply directly with queries on a product, which remains tracked in the system. Audubon Supply can seamlessly track each interaction to make sure it is addressed. In addition, the record lets customers who were browsing more easily order a product at a later date, and the record lets Audubon Supply know of popular products to keep their inventory current.
Audubon Supply started using Moblico in the winter of 2020, and, as such, does not have a range of comparison data. However, the anecdotal feedback from both customers and staff is that the new system is a hit. The staff finds it easy to use and likes the ability to keep the personal touch aspect active on technology. The customers appreciate the ease and convenience of the additional communication channel.
“What Moblico has proven is that with text, you have a direct connection that is easy to use and that the customer responds to better,” said Murphy.
For 2021, Audubon Supply is planning to explore and grow its business using Moblico’s range of resources and products. and will also look to economic trends in the new year to possibly enhance their marketing efforts with expansion into additional Moblico solutions.