What was said
What this says
Current to 11 Oct 26Ruth Ackroyd, Head of Customer Operations, described three disconnected systems and audit pressure. Tom Ashdown pointed to Growth at about £51,600 including implementation. She wants a demo on Dunholm data.
What happened: Tom Ashdown ran a discovery call on 26 Jun 2024 with Ruth Ackroyd. She explained that answering one customer question takes most of a day across order, quality and call records.
Customer view: Aerospace and energy customers audit Dunholm Precision, and Ruth owns the customer side of each audit. She wants sourced answers, not estimates.
Commercial: Tom positioned the Growth tier and a ballpark of £51,600 that includes the one-off implementation, to be confirmed in writing. Ruth is the buyer, but the managing director wants a decision before the end of the autumn and will want to know it pays off.
Watch: Ruth asked for a demo on real data and for real manufacturer examples. The business systems analyst is not yet involved, and the connector list is still vague.
Themes
Current to 9 Oct 26Who was there
BB-Demo
Them
Follow-up
Next steps
Current to 9 Oct 26- Tom Ashdown to send demo dates that week and get the business systems analyst on a call.
- Tom Ashdown to run the demo on Dunholm Precision data, ahead of the 25 Oct 2024 planning date.
- Tom Ashdown to confirm pricing in writing and bring real manufacturer examples and audit evidence material.
Risks
Current to 9 Oct 26- The managing director has not yet met BB-Demo and will want proof that it pays off.
- Ruth Ackroyd rejects estimates and generic demos, so a weak demo would hurt the deal.
- The connector list is uncertain until the business systems analyst is involved.
Opportunities
Current to 9 Oct 26- A Growth tier sale across order management, quality and sales engineers, starting with about a dozen users.
- Audit evidence is a clear value case: sourced answers on delivery and quality escapes.
Transcript
- Tom Ashdown NoneRuth, hello, afternoon. Can you hear me alright? Good. How's your week been? Anything exciting going on in Sheffield, or is it just the usual?
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneAfternoon, Tom. Busy. We've a customer audit coming up and I've spent most of the week pulling evidence together. Which is partly why we're talking to you.
- Tom Ashdown NoneRight, no drama, that's a good place to start then. So, I'll say what I'd like to get out of the next half hour. I want to understand how you work today, what's annoying you, and where your information lives. I'm not going to pitch at you. Is that alright?
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneThat's fine. Short version of the problem. Customer orders are in one system. Quality tickets are in another. And what the sales engineers say to customers on calls is somewhere else again. To answer one question about one customer, I'm opening three things.
- Tom Ashdown NoneMm. Give me an example. Last time it bit you. What was the question?
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneA customer asked why a batch of parts was late and whether the earlier quality issue on the same part number was connected. To answer that I needed the order history, the quality ticket, and what our sales engineer had promised them on a call. It took most of a day.
- Tom Ashdown NoneA day. Right. And who was doing the digging, you?
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneMe, and someone from order management. Which means two people off the job for a day, for one answer.
- Tom Ashdown NoneYeah. And the audits. You said that's every customer, is that right? Sorry, I'm rambling, I'll let you answer.
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneAerospace and energy customers audit us. I own the customer side of every one. They want to see we caught quality escapes early and that we delivered on time. Right first time. If I can't show it, I fail it.
- Tom Ashdown NoneOkay. So what would good look like? If I waved a wand.
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneI type a question. Which customer, which part, what happened, what was said. I get an answer with the source behind it. Not a guess. If it's an estimate, I don't want it.
- Tom Ashdown NoneThat's what the brain is meant to do. It sits over those systems, inside your own Snowflake account, so your data stays with you, and people ask it questions in plain English. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Tell me about the systems. How many things would we need to connect?
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneOrder system, quality system, the call recorder the engineers use, and email. Maybe a couple more. Our business systems analyst would know better than me. He looks after how they all fit together.
- Tom Ashdown NoneGood, I'd like him on the next call then. Who else would use it? Just your team?
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneOrder management, quality, and the sales engineers. Perhaps a dozen to start. I wouldn't give it to the whole shop floor.
- Tom Ashdown NoneThat sounds like our Growth tier, which is for several teams rather than one. I'm not going to quote you a price off the top of my head, but just so you've got the ballpark, a deal like this would be in the region of £51,600 all in, that's with the one-off implementation included. I'll confirm that properly in writing.
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneI'll hold you to the writing. Send me the evidence for whatever it is. What does the implementation involve? How long?
- Tom Ashdown NoneFixed fee, a matter of weeks, and one of our implementation people would connect the sources and check the first refresh lands. I'd rather our solutions engineer walk you through it than me wave my hands. That's what a demo is for.
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneFine. But do it on our data, not a sample. I've seen enough demos with pretend customers.
- Tom Ashdown NoneFair enough, leave that with me. We'll need a bit of access from your analyst to do that. What about timing? Is there a date you're working to?
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneMy managing director wants a decision before the end of the autumn. He leaves supplier choices to me but he'll want to know it pays off.
- Tom Ashdown NoneRight. In our system I've pencilled in Friday 25 October 2024 as the date we'd aim to have it decided. That's a planning date, not a promise from either of us.
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneGood, that's honest. So next steps. You get my analyst on a call, you do the demo on our data, and then the proposal, and then my managing director sees it. In that order.
- Tom Ashdown NoneThat's the plan. I'll send a note this week with a couple of dates for the demo, probably next month. Anything else you'd like me to bring?
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneExamples of how other manufacturers use it. Real ones, not slides. And something on how the audit evidence is kept.
- Tom Ashdown NoneWill do. Thanks, Ruth, really useful. Speak soon.
- Ruth Ackroyd NoneThanks, Tom. Send me the dates. Bye.