Ed Lynde is a fourth generation owner and operator of Lynde Greenhouse, a producer, wholesaler, and retailer of horticultural products located in Maple Grove, MN, a suburb of Minneapolis. Although the business has been in existence for 100 years, Lynde introduced retail space a mere 19 years ago. With an impressive 185,000 square feet, Lynde has allocated over 23,000 of that to retail. We spoke with Lynde recently about how he's using Catapult to manage his expansive operation.

Embracing The Latest Technology : A Skeptic's Story

"Over the years we've burned through several low and middle-end retail systems," explains Lynde. "A few years ago we started making inquiries in our search for a top quality POS and backroom system that could handle our volume and diversity. Someone eventually referred us to our local Catapult Dealer in Minneapolis. When I saw Catapult for the first time I was very opposed to scanning at the checkout counter. With five checkout lines, I was afraid that scanning would cause bottlenecking at the POS. I felt the same way about switching over to touchscreens. I thought it was just more confusing technology to slow things down. A close friend of mine in the restaurant business assured me that my technological misgivings were irrational." Lynde installed Catapult in October of 2000 and was quite impressed with how the system performed. "The touchscreen and scanning sped up the flow at the checkout lanes considerably." Lynde shared the following anecdote:

"One night after tracking down a $200 discrepancy in the day's sales with Catapult's Electronic Journal, I decided to take the start and end time for each of that day's transactions to determine the average checkout time. I figured it would be in the neighborhood of two or three minutes. But once I'd averaged it out, the final figure was an astounding 54 seconds. Given the large and often cumbersome items my customers purchase, I found it hard to believe that the average transaction time was under a minute. But after talking to several of my cashiers, they showed no surprise when I shared my findings. The overwhelming consensus among my employees was that the 54-second average was a direct result of Catapult's scanning and touchscreen capabilities."

Remote Administration : Catapult & pcAnywhere

Although Lynde's business trips frequently separate him geographically from his operation, he can't afford to be disconnected from his daily sales figures. Lynde uses Symantec's pcAnywere for remote Catapult administration when he's on the road. "I wait until the store has closed for the night, then dial into my server to study product groups and run reports," he says. "Sometimes I simply look for red flags in a day's transactions, but very often I save reports to my travel laptop and actually perform data manipulation from afar. This remote access to Catapult's powerful reporting and history is an invaluable feature of the system from an adminstrative perspective."