Case Studies
Because much of the work we do is sub-
contracted for by other (i.e., larger) website
design and development firms, we do not
publish a complete list of our clients and we
do not refer to any client unless we've
received specific permission from them to do
so. The following clients, however, work with
us directly and have agreed to be listed here
and also to make themselves available to
discuss/comment on our services.
Zingerman's
Rooted firmly in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Zingerman's has been called many flattering things, among them
'The coolest small company in America' (
Inc. Magazine),
and 'One of 25 of the World's Best Food Markets' (
Food & Wine), and the company
indeed lives up to its self-proclaimed title as 'an Ann Arbor institution.'
For more than 25 years Zingerman's has been commited to delivering the
most flavorful, traditionally-made foods to their customers,
and in the process they've become one of the country's leading specialty
food retailers – well known not only their wide selection of
high-quality foods from all corners of the world but also for their
unwavering commitment to customer service and satisfaction.
It's that commitment to providing customers with the very best
service that's at the heart of the
Zingerman's website.
For nearly ten years, Kane Koval Associates has been working
with Zingerman's to live up to that commitment, and we've seen their
website –
now in it's third version – through many changes,
both large and small, but all of them with one primary goal:
to serve the customer better.
Now built on the Microsoft® .NET platform, the Zingerman's
website is a custom-built e-commerce system with a number of
features not typically found in off-the-shelf e-commerce
packages (e.g., select your own delivery date, multiple
shipment orders, custom gift messages, e-gift cards, address
verification, etc.). The website is also integrated directly
with the company's call center application (a secure intranet
site – also developed by us) so orders placed by
customers on the website can be pulled up immediately by
customer service personnel in the call center – even
when the order has not yet been completed. It's this level
of commitment to customer service that has helped Zingerman's
earn its exalted reputation, and it has truly become the
standard by which other service-related businesses measure
themselves.
| Project: | Zingerman's Mail Order Website |
| Client / Partner: | Zingerman's Mail Order |
| Website URL: | http://www.zingermans.com |
| Our Role: | Front-end development, back-end development, CRM integration |
| Tools / Technologies: | ASP.NET, C#, AJAX, SQL Server, RedGate |
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Busch's
Based in Ann Arbor, Busch's is a privately held, independent
supermarket chain with 15 stores in Southeastern
Michigan. Recognized as an industry leader by
Store Equipment
and Design Magazine, Busch's newer stores include café
areas where guests can enjoy fresh brewed coffee and sample the
exciting array of fresh gourmet foods from Busch's Kitchen.
Busch's, like Zingerman's, 'walks the walk' when it comes to
customer service, and their outstanding quality and selection of
foods is matched only by their passion for hospitality; naturally,
they wanted their website to reflect their commitment to customer
service.
Busch's MyWay is a secure, personalized, and feature-rich
web application where guests
can create and maintain an online
account that helps them plan their entire week's meals around
their purchasing habits and upcoming sales at their local Busch's store,
saving them both time and money.
Custom built on the Microsoft® .NET platform, Busch's MyWay offers a host of functionality,
with many features not offered by any other grocer. Personalized weekly specials,
shopping list libraries, single-click conversion of a shopping list into an
online order (that is then filled by Busch's and can be picked
up at the time and store of the guest's choosing) – these
are just some of the ways in which Busch's makes shopping easier
and more convenient for their guests.
| Project: | Busch's MyWay Website |
| Client / Partner: | Busch's |
| Website URL: | https://secure.buschs.com/myway/about.aspx |
| Our Role: | Front-end development, back-end development, integration with existing systems and website |
| Tools / Technologies: | ASP.NET, C#, AJAX, Web Services, SQL Server, RedGate, IRC |
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Zingerman's Coffee Company
Established in 2003 in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Zingerman's Coffee Co.
is a wholesale roaster supplying cafes, restaurants and businesses,
and their goal is simple: to source and roast the great coffees
of the world.
The process of bringing their customers that simple
cup involves a surprisingly intricate journey along with many
people and relationships, and they care about every facet of the
journey; from the farmer to the customer.
Zingerman's Coffee Company coffees are available at Zingerman's Deli Next Door Café,
Zingerman's Roadhouse and Zingerman's Bakehouse and at cafés and
restaurants and in offices around the country.
Zingerman's Coffee Company approached Kane Koval Associates
to help them streamline their wholesale order processing
system.
Custom-built on the LAMP stack, the end result is a system that is both easy for their customers
to use and for the Coffee Company to maintain. The new wholesale
order application (
WhOA!) has transformed a complex,
manual process into an almost entirely automated system and
reduced the labor involved in entering and preparing orders for
production from several hours per week to less than 30 minutes.
The new system includes a secure web application where wholesale customers
can log in to place orders, an application integration component that
extracts new orders from the web site and uploads them into
the Peachtree accounting system, and a second integration piece
that drives a specialized label/barcode printer.
| Project: | Zingerman's Coffee Co. Wholesale Order Application (WhOA!) |
| Client / Partner: | Zingerman's Coffee Company |
| Website URL: | http://www.zingermanscoffee.com/wholesale/ |
| Our Role: | Website / application design, front-end development, back-end development, integration with existing systems and website |
| Tools / Technologies: | PHP, Zend Framework, MySQL, C#, Peachtree Accounting API, Seagull BarTender, IRC |
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Foster Energy Services
Foster Energy Services is a Michigan-based
company that provides reliable natural gas
supplies at competitive prices along with superior
management services to large commercial and
industrial customers, local municipalities,
and educational institutions. Foster's mission
statement is "To establish ourselves as a premier
energy provider of competitive products and services
along with superior customer service that creates
added value to each and every customer."
Since 2002, Foster Energy Services has been serving
the customer choice program in Michigan through its subsidiary
My Choice Energy in Marine City, which has over 10,000 customers statewide.
My Choice Energy currently provides natural gas
to both residential and commercial customers behind
DTE/MichCon, Consumers Energy, and SEMCO Energy (lower peninsula).
Foster Energy Services reached out to Kane Koval Associates
to help them remove the inefficiencies in their day-to-day
operations and help them focus on serving their customers better.
Working closely with Foster to understand how they work, we built
GCMS (Gas Choice Management System) from the ground up (on the
Microsoft® .NET platform) and turned
a laborious, time-consuming, and error-prone process based on
Microsoft® Excel spreadsheets into one that's both totally automated
and completely transparent. The file/data processing, commission
management, gas transaction, and reporting functionality in GCMS
would require more room than we have here – contact us
if you want to know more about this system and others like it that we've
developed for our clients in the energy industry.
| Project: | Gas Choice Management System (GCMS) |
| Client / Partner: | Foster Energy Services |
| Website URL: | Intranet application |
| Our Role: | Website / application design, front-end development, back-end development |
| Tools / Technologies: | ASP.NET, C#, Javascript, AJAX, SQL Server, IRC, WebEx |
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