Kosmea founder Marie Kapetanakis established her business from the kitchen of her Adelaide home back in 1993, and more than 21 years later she now sells her range of natural skin care products throughout Australia as well as to Canada, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, UK and the USA.
With current staff numbers at 10, the company continues to grow and aims to expand beyond its existing stockists which include a number of health food stores, national pharmacy chains and high-end retailer David Jones.
It was time for a makeover
The health and beauty market is ultra-competitive and while Marie Kapetanakis has been very loyal to MYOB - “I still have the original box on my shelf!” - she knew Kosmea needed to review their existing software. “We were using AccountRight Premier Enterprise but we had reached the point where the demands of our business were growing significantly and we needed to upgrade,” she says.
There were some unique complexities to consider, as Marie points out: “We have multi warehouse requirements, which requires stock to be held in an outsourced warehouse, a 3rd party manufacturing site, as well as holding stock in our own office.”
"We have trust in the MYOB brand and as it turned out their Advanced solution really did have everything we needed."
- Marie Kapetanakis, Founder, Kosmea
A step up to the cloud broadened horizons
Kosmea met up with David from BusinessHub, an experienced MYOB Partner. Going with MYOB was not a given, as Marie says: “While we have a lot of trust in the MYOB brand and have been using their products for 20 years, loyalty is earned, not taken for granted”.
After a thorough evaluation Kosmea decided upon the one integrated solution that met all of their needs and had the capacity to help the company grow into the future — MYOB Advanced.
“Firstly, it was cloud-based software which is perfect for our team working off site, but much more than that, MYOB Advanced could accurately control our inventory, manage customer special pricing and segment our customer groups without any drama.”
"We have a solid foundation to grow on and MYOB Advanced can help us expand the business," she adds.
The beauty of 100% flexibility and visibility
From a business perspective, Kosmea now has more flexibility and visibility, in no small part due to the fact that everybody — including those working off site — has access to critical information and numbers, which in turn improves productivity.
While Kosmea has come a long way, Marie Kapetanakis is looking to what’s ahead.
“We have a solid foundation to grow on and MYOB Advanced can help us expand the business, particularly as we enter the US market which will see us embark on further product development.”
Before MYOB Advanced Business | After MYOB Advanced Business |
|---|---|
Business demands had outgrown existing system Stock inventory and control too difficult to manage Staff working off-site had limited access to critical data | 24/7 access provides more flexibility for all staff Easy segmentation of customers into groups Software allows for separate promotional based pricing and wholesale-based pricing |
