Schratter Foods

Schratter Foods, Inc. is a leading importer and distributor of fine gourmet cheeses, chocolate, and pâté. Its retail and food service cheese division, ANCO Fine Cheese, provides merchandising, marketing, training, cutting, and wrapping services to U.S. food distribution centers such as supermarket and delicatessen chains. Schratter Foods, which sells the Ile de France brand along with many others, is owned by French cheese exporter, Bongrain SA, and operates a New Jersey headquarters and five regional office and warehouse locations in New Jersey, Miami, Houston, and Los Angeles.

“Our previous system was already costly to maintain, and we were concerned that extending the system’s footprint would similarly multiply costs.”
- Jude Hennessey, IT Operations Manager, Schratter Foods.

Schratter Foods' growth exposed new and pressing telecommunications needs that the company’s legacy PBX system simply couldn’t meet. Without a central call center, and full-time receptionists available only at the Florida and New Jersey locations, some calls never reached their destinations, potentially losing customers and threatening to sour the company’s time-sensitive distribution network. Further, every change and addition required complex and time-consuming programming. And because the company’s PBX was not IP-based, it couldn’t be integrated into Bongrain’s global WAN to take advantage of VoIP least-cost routing and unified communications (UC) features. 

“It was clear that a fresh approach was needed so we could quickly add new locations and extensions, automate call handling and routing, and integrate seamlessly with Bongrain’s WAN, all without significant cost and effort.”
- Jude Hennessey, IT Operations Manager, Schratter Foods.

ShoreTel's ease of implementation was important to Schratter to avoid disrupting its time-sensitive distribution network. The ShoreTel unified communications (UC) system was installed first at the new corporate headquarters during the summer, followed by deployments in the Miami, Los Angeles, and New Jersey warehouses and another in the Texas facility. The deployment consisted of ShoreTel T1, 120, and 60 Voice Switches plus 140 ShoreTel IP Phones distributed across multiple locations.  Shortly after the system was installed, Schratter's staff noticed immediate operational improvements as a result of streamlined communications. Other benefits include:

• Cost-competitive ShoreTel pricing gave Schratter the functionality required at a lower initial outlay than similar products. 
• Ease and speed of implementation and scaling fit Schratter's move into a new headquarters, and enables the company to quickly expand into new locations.
• Five-nines availability helps ensure all calls are received throughout the entire company. 
• Effective call routing capabilities result in cost savings on long distance.
• ShoreTel Director's streamlined, Web-based management tools simplify moves, adds, and changes, and make it easy to configure extensions for specific functions.
• Centralized call reporting across all locations helps to optimize system and network performance, and avoid unnecessary toll charges.

“ShoreTel has given us a platform for growth that enables us to expand to meet our internal and market needs.”
- Jude Hennessey, IT Operations Manager, Schratter Foods.