Galifornia dealer adds online sales

r|-IWO-UNIT Mead Clark Lumber

I- Co., Santa Rosa, Ca., has entered the world of e-commerce, determined to level the playing field with warehouse competitors.

Mead Clark sees electronic commerce and online ordering as a necessary competitive advantage, according to Jean Gillespie, director of multimedia. "Contractors spend the business day on the job site, so they need to be able to locate items, check prices, and place orders in the evenings," Gillespie explains. "Several of the big box building material retailers are open until late evening or even 24 hours a day. E-commerce allows us to do business after hours, too."

Customers are anxious to see how Mead Clark's site can help them, she said. "A number of our customers have expressed real interest in using Internet technology to be more efficient. We can now offer our customers the ability to place orders, check the status of an order, and view their account information right from a Web phone. That kind of flexibility means our customers can transact business when and where they need to, resulting in less down time for them."

Channelinx's eLinx Order Management System is powering Mead Clark's electronic storefront, including a complete product catalog and their online ordering capabilities. After logging on to Mead Clark's Web site, customers will find desired items using drill-down, keyword, and parametric searches, and view their specific price for each item.

ship, including customer-specific pricing, is important to Mead Clark," notes Gillespie. "We want e-commerce to be a natural extension of the exceptional customer service we offer in our stores."

Transactions processed through Mead Clark's Web site will automatically integrate with their back-office system. "Making the entire process as automated as possible was very important to us. We don't want to rekey information received through our Web site, and we want our customers to see real-time information," says Gillespie.

For 88 years, Mead Clark Lumber Co. has provided lumber, plywood, and related building materials to Sonoma, Napa, Marin, and Lake counties in California. The company anticipates its new e-commerce venture will feature the physical locations' long-time specialties: a knowledgeable sales staff, a wide variety of hardware and tools, computerized quotes, job costing services, and specialized pricing by job lot or project. Mead Clark expected to begin selling online by May l.