A lot less administrative work

Willy Reynders Garden Architecture has been growing with digitization for 11 years

From a garden contracting company with forty years of experience on the counter, you might initially expect an unwieldy structure, hidden behind piles of paper. A misplaced assumption, as Willy Reynders Tuinarchitectuur proves. The company, active in design, construction and maintenance of mainly private gardens, very consciously jumped on the bandwagon of digitization and can, partly thanks to Groensoft, count on a flourishing record from Beringen to beyond the borders of the Netherlands, Germany and even France.

Eleven years have passed since Willy Reynders Garden Architecture traded in the familiar Excel sheets for Groensoft. "It was my brother who encouraged me to do so," recalls landscaper Piet Rietveld. "He was working with the related software package Bouwsoft and advised me to make the switch as well. We have been loyal users ever since. More so, when we became part of the APK group two years ago and there was talk of migrating to another software package, common in the rest of that group, we stood firm and secured an exception."

Full color plant frames

At the time Willy Reynders Garden Architecture made the switch, there were already some administrative software packages on the market, but one thing was decisive for Rietveld: "I absolutely wanted the ability to print our plant lists with photos and in color. Groensoft was unique in that at the time, and even today it is still a distinguishing feature of the package."

As a result, there is a lot to suit your needs in the package's various libraries and modules. "We can put all the necessary information about certain materials, tools or rates in Groensoft. That in itself brings a special flexibility, in the sense that we can adapt the package perfectly to our operation. But on top of that, every change is also extrapolated to all related documents. That saves our administration a lot of work."

Available anytime, anywhere

What once started with plant lists and quotations has now become a fully integrated work package. "In the first place, we use Groensoft for quotations, calculations, post-calculations and customer management, but, for example, our entire mail system is also linked to it. This has already proven to be a blessing not only in the office, but also outside. For example, thanks to the Mobile Pro app, I always have access to the system. Handy when I want to quickly check on site what is planned, but also for communication purposes. If I notice on Saturday that certain planned works cannot take place at the scheduled time due to weather conditions, for example, I can notify the client directly via the app."

However, Rietveld was somewhat hesitant when Groensoft switched from a local system to the cloud some four years ago. "I was indeed afraid that certain things would run less smoothly, but in the end that fear proved unjustified. Also, the fact that no local copies are made today helps to avoid errors and discussions and streamline everything."

From desk to yard

Meanwhile, the next step, that from desk to yard, is also being thoroughly prepared. Groensoft recently introduced Didit, a digital work order app that allows work and materials to be checked off directly in the system from the construction site. "In principle, our teams receive a daily printout of the measurement sheet and pre-calculation, on which they indicate on the spot what has or has not been used. Today, however, we are also letting some teams test Didit. As such, it is too early to draw any conclusions, but we have high expectations. Because if everything is registered directly, then the lists no longer need to be copied into the system manually, you reduce the number of administrative actions and thus save a lot of time. In a manner of speaking, you can then send out an invoice even before the team has arrived back at the office."