Toolbox is Born

In 2006, Horny Toad - a ‘lifestyle' apparel manufacturer (www.hornytoad.com) -- approached ZaneRay about creating an online tool for their retail buyers to be able to visually create an order for their clothing.  Instead of seeing rows and columns on an order form, buyers would be able to see pictures of their upcoming clothing line and simply drag and drop these pictures onto a palette to create their order. There were technical hurdles but one of the major challenges was how to create such a tool that was also affordable by a mid-sized manufacturer.

Horny Toad was able to provide the vision of how the web-based tool should function, and what it should look like. ZaneRay provided the technical know-how, and was able to leverage their existing Java tools (Zfoundation Commerce Suite tools) to provide the needed functionality quickly and affordably. The result was unveiled at the 2007 Summer Outdoor Retailer show as the "Horny Toad Dealer Toolbox".  Gordon Seabury, CEO of Horny Toad, had this to say to say about the response: "We have made a serious commitment to streamlining the buying process to make life easier for our retail buyers on so many levels. And provide the visual merchandising experience in the process. Our sales reps--another user and benefactor of the tool -- cannot believe how intuitive their buying flow has now become. Product workbooks, spreadsheets, order forms, sticky notes, contacts--they've all been combined into this wonderfully visual tool. I believe we're contributing to a new paradigm for the lifestyle apparel business. And based on the initial response, we are very excited about its future potential."

A movie is worth a thousand words, click here to see a Quicktime demo of the Toolbox:

Next Step: Commercialization of the Toolbox.

The ultimate vision of the Toolbox is to become recognized and embraced by many manufacturers. Buyers would then have one tool to be able to make their merchandising decisions for most of their apparel buy.  ZaneRay is working on that vision by making the Toolbox available to other apparel manufacturers as a service - a.k.a. ‘ASP' ("Application Service Provider") -- model. Horny Toad remains actively involved in providing guidance for future upgrades and the overall vision of the tool.

As a service, manufacturers will not need to install and manage the Toolbox software. In a nutshell, manufacturers will load their information into the Toolbox service, and the service will return orders. 

Seeking Early Adopters

ZaneRay is seeking one or two apparel manufacturers to be early adopter customers for the Toolbox service. As an early adopter, you will be a ‘guinea pig' of sorts, but will also be an integral part of its commercialization. Early adopters can expect to make the new service available to their customers in 3-6 months.

Earlier adopters will enjoy some benefits for their participation:

• Will be one of the first to offer the service to their buyers
• Will have direct input into the service functionality
• Will be offered pricing benefits

Interested in being an early adopter? Contact Reed Gregerson at ZaneRay. reed@zaneray.com , or 406-863-8000 for a whitepaper and details.