Background

Sapa Building Systems is a world leader in aluminum solutions. The company, which started with a single press in Vetlanda, Sweden, is now one of the largest aluminum extrusion companies in the world, made up of 23,000 employees over 40 countries. 2013 marked both the 50th anniversary of the company and the birth of a new entity: Sapa, the result of the merger between Hydro Aluminium Extrusion and Sapa Group. Sapa serves architects, designers, specifiers, and contractors with a wide range of aluminium systems for use in construction and power generation projects. 

The Problem

While the aluminum industry is experiencing dramatic growth, it is also currently faced with numerous environmental and structural challenges. This combination means it is critical that the industry focuses on innovation and constant collaboration, working closely with customers to develop tailored solutions. To maintain its competitive advantage, Sapa understood it had to develop new business processes and improve its knowledge of customers and partners to better sell and service their needs. They also needed a global solution to improve visibility into the business and bring consistency to the customer experience. To do this, Sapa chose Bluewolf to implement a global Salesforce solution tailored for their organization. 

The Solution

Bluewolf worked with Sapa to build a global vision for the organization and simplify business processes in order to bring consistency across all global projects, currencies, languages, and territories. The team then translated that into Salesforce. 

With Bluewolf’s help, Sapa was also able to implement a new client scoring system. Now, each customer is assigned a score based on several criteria, including revenue, market share, level of customer relationship, and product coverage. Teams can now identify the best opportunities and focus their efforts on the most qualified projects and customers.

To ensure proper adoption, Sapa leveraged Bluewolf’s change management services, through which we organized trainings on the new solution across 750 employees throughout Europe, Asia, and Africa. Bluewolf hosted “Key User” meetings in Paris to educate, adapt, and explain training for each department. 

The Results

The global Salesforce implementation was completed for Sapa in less than a year, generating significant savings. The entire organization now benefits from the single system, allowing employees to easily assign customers to the most relevant sales teams with the click of a button. Sales processes have been standardized and automated, driving both organizational efficiencies (like higher productivity, as well as enhanced collaboration between employees and external partners) and tangible business results. 

The solution also brings a better understanding of Sapa’s customers’ needs, driving a better customer service experience, and yielding higher customer satisfaction rates. Ultimately this improved customer experience is helping Sapa maintain a competitive advantage and grow in the market.