How Rasco Aligns Its American & Canadian Teams with a CRM

When you see technicians working on telephone poles and electric lines, you’re probably not thinking about what they’re wearing.

Actually, you’re probably not thinking about anything other than that human being is 40 feet in the air.

But the clothes that technicians and workers wear are incredibly important. And for the last 30 years, Rasco has been creating high-performance workwear that keeps them safe.

Because hey, if you're working 12 hours a day while totally uncomfortable, you're more likely to be injured because you're not fully focused on your work. Comfort’s important—for not just enjoyment, but also safety.

So, does an apparel company really need a CRM?

For a long time, Rasco had no CRM at all. As Tarek Shahla (Rasco’s Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel) recalls, “It was bad. We basically threw our salespeople out into the wild and said, ‘Good luck, happy hunting. Come back at some point.’ Without a CRM, they were just lost. There's no coordination with the team.”

Luckily, one of Rasco’s Canadian sales reps (who’s now a Sales Manager), Deator, just so happened to be a Copper beta tester in a previous role at another company.

“Deator's a sharp guy and a great salesperson,” says Tarek. “We're so fortunate that he spoke up and suggested Copper—and that we listened! All our colleagues and vendors that I know who deal with the other big CRM, they hate it. They lose so much time because they're just sitting there doing data entry.”

Even though Rasco had the branding and the name recognition, it still struggled because of miscommunication and missed tasks. “We were winging it, and that meant we were losing track of warm leads. Sometimes we didn’t even send the trade show lists out. We couldn’t keep track of everything and we needed accountability.”

International team, international teamwork.

For an international team that attends 25 shows every year (in two countries), Rasco just wasn’t unlocking the full potential in returns. “Our ROI was ridiculously bad. In our business, the lifecycle to get ROI is typically pretty long. But it was exacerbated because no one was following up with leads at trade shows. Stuff was falling through the cracks, both with active customers and opportunities.”

After the team started to use Copper at trade shows, Tarek saw a marked difference in conversions.

“Now, we’re converting faster than ever. We’re getting leads, following up, and getting business—and at a significant volume. Using Copper to keep track of the whole process is making a huge, huge difference on our ROI.”

Using Copper also helped the team collaborate better. Before, when leads contacted Rasco, they only occasionally got passed on to the right team member because of a lack of coordination. That’s the kind of thing that happens when you don’t have automated tasks, proper account lists, or lead routing assignments. Plus, Rasco’s reps get about a hundred emails a day.

The result: even though they had all of this business approaching them directly, the conversion rate was low—by Tarek’s estimates, around 30%.

Not anymore.

“Copper’s enabling us to actually have a fully coordinated, organized sales process. And the results show why that’s important—sales are up across the board. I’d say every territory is up at least 30%, in some cases even 50%.”

Visibility is a must, no matter how big the team.

Rasco’s sales team is made up of both employees and contractors across the US and Canada. Aligning such a large group is no easy feat. But by creating accountability through a single, accessible source of truth, management can quickly identify areas that need support.

“Copper’s really improved accountability,” says Tarek. “It's allowing us to get visibility into everything and jump in to help when necessary.”

And of course, no more data entry.

In addition to better teamwork and transparency, the time savings can’t be overlooked. Especially when we’re talking about hours saved—per person—every week.

“The average salesperson on our team using Copper is saving five to 10 hours a week just because they don't have to go back to their hotel room on the road and type up emails,” says Tarek.

“Copper has helped us conquer so much new territory, and the international team is finally in sync. They’re doing amazing things they couldn’t do before.”