MIETrak Pro with Bacon Engineering

Another successful ERP implementation for MIETrak Pro with Bacon Engineering

There are very few engineering companies today that can boast a heritage as rich as Bacon Engineering. This year it celebrates 125 years in business with a 5thgeneration Bacon family member at the helm along with operations director Darren Glew. Its story is one of twists and turns, evolving from a trawler operator in the heyday of the Grimsby fishing industry into the modern and progressive engineering company that today has established itself as a trusted partner across an array of sectors, including chemical, construction, food, marine and energy/renewables to name just a few.

In the past 78 years, the business has been through a significant period of modernisation, moving to a new larger premises on the Humberside Industrial Estate and replacing most of its old machinery with stateoftheart CNC equipment, growing a highly capable fabrication team with a range of codings, while diversifying into Drone and laser scanning technology. In June of this year, Bacon Engineering implemented MIETrak Pro ERP software believing this would take the company to the ‘next levels and beyond’, leaving behind the final administrative remnants of its ‘oldfashioned familyrun business’ structure.

After identifying the need for ERP software in today’s competitive manufacturing industry, Bacon Engineering began a period of market research, searching both online and speaking with industry peers to produce a shortlist of 4 ERP providers. All were then demoed and tested against their specific requirements and MIETrak Pro was selected as being the most comprehensive.

David Bacon, managing director of Bacon Engineering says: “ The deciding factor for us was a trusted partner of ours are already MIETrak users and so we were able to really pick their brains on the system and their experiences, giving us confidence that MIETrak Pro claims met its abilities.”

After selecting MIETrak Pro as its ERP provider, Bacon Engineering next looked to the implementation process. David Bacon explains how they approached this next stage: ‘‘The biggest challenge we faced was to create the headspace within the business to learn and understand the system. This is difficult within a small business when resources are lean but ultimately we had to remember that MIETrak was acquired to improve our efficiencies and processes, so we began appointing super users and focused on rolling the system out 1 team at a time. The expertise of the MIE Solutions team has played a crucial role in our success, we have felt supported every step of the way and I commend the team for their responsiveness to our needs.’’

MIETrak Pro is a complete modular software package designed specifically for the sheet metal industry, managing everything from initial customer inquiry through to invoice and shipping and everything in between. The biggest advantage for Bacon Engineering since installation is the software’s advanced analytics and data collection abilities. David Bacon explains: “This is a massive step forward for us, as it now allows us to make evidencebased decisions across a far broader range of business functions that we couldn’t have done previously. We now have a single system across the entire business containing our quoting and performance data which is proving a game changer.”

The next big step for the company is to fully utilise the ‘scheduling module’ of MIETrak Pro. David Bacon says: “We cannot wait, embedding this module into our daily operations will surely only elevate the exceptional service we already offer our customers, by allowing us to meticulously plan work orders and create ’work to lists’ for the shopfloor whilst providing all the production analysis we need to remain proactive in delivering all project on time.” Bacon Engineering’s period of modernisation is realised with the incorporation of MIETrak Pro into daily operations. With a whole host of modules for the company to grow into and with the continued support from the MIE team, the sky is the limit for this dynamic and adaptable engineering business.