BOSTON – June 16, 2008 – Experian QAS, a part of Experian® (LSE: EXPN) specializing in customer data quality software and services today announced that Fairytale Brownies, a $10M multichannel retailer shipping more than 200,000 orders annually and long time Experian QAS customer, has achieved significant cost savings while improving customer service by using Experian QAS data quality solutions. The company has saved $30,000 annually in address correction fees and $100,000 in unnecessary shipping expenses.
Founded in 1992, Fairytale Brownies began with a 49-year-old secret family recipe and a dream to spread joy to the world through gourmet chocolate brownies backed with extraordinary customer service. As its retail operations grew from coffee houses to catalogs, the company increasingly incurred costs when customers provided incomplete shipping addresses. Since choosing to work with Experian QAS in 2004 to prevent these costs and improve its customers’ purchasing experience, Fairytale Brownies and data quality solutions from Experian QAS have helped more than 800,000 gifts reach their destination. With addresses corrected before packages ship, Fairytale Brownies has reduced the amount of time it takes to get the gift of chocolate to its customers, translating to an improved customer experience and helping the company to become a three-time BizRate Circle of Excellence Gold Honoree.
“We are in the gift-giving business where timeliness is critical and address errors very quickly translate into lost revenue and unhappy customers,” said David Kravetz, co-founder of Fairytale Brownies. “Thanks to Experian QAS verifying our address data during every point across our business we are seeing a dramatic decline in the number of address errors and the fees associated with them. At the same time, we are experiencing improved customer satisfaction and an overall more effective ordering process.”
Fairytale Brownies initially tried to develop its own solution to the problem of incorrect address entries, but over time this solution proved insufficient. After extensive market research, the company turned to QAS Pro to assist their call center and implemented the product after several months of rigorous testing. Fairytale Brownies recorded an immediate decline in the number of bad addresses it received though its call center, but felt the number of bad addresses taken via their Website was still unacceptably high. To resolve this challenge the company added QAS Pro Web and, later on, selected QAS Batch to handle large corporate gift orders.
“Fairytale Brownies is an ideal example of how Experian QAS solutions quickly have a direct impact on a company’s bottom line while improving the customer experience,” said Joel Curry, chief operating officer, Experian QAS. “Our entire suite of data quality solutions can meet one specific need or meet all the needs of an entire organization. Fairytale Brownies has proven that with the QAS suite of products, you can’t stop at just one.”
The Experian QAS product portfolio includes:
About Experian QAS
Experian QAS is an address data quality software pioneer. The company's products capture, validate, cleanse, standardize and enrich customer contact information. Experian QAS provides solutions to more than 10,000 customers worldwide in retail, education, healthcare, insurance, finance, government and other sectors. The company was established in 1990 and has offices throughout the U.S., Europe and Asia Pacific. For more information, visit http://www.qas.com.
Experian is a global leader in providing informational, analytical, and marketing services to organizations and consumers to help manage the risk and reward of commercial and financial decisions. Combining its unique information tools and deep understanding of individuals, markets, and economies, Experian partners with organizations around the world to establish and strengthen customer relationships and provide their businesses with competitive advantage. For consumers, Experian delivers critical information that enables them to make financial and purchasing decisions with greater control and confidence. Clients include organizations from financial services, retail and catalog, telecommunications, utilities, media, insurance, automotive, leisure, e-commerce, manufacturing, property, and government sectors.
Experian Group Limited is listed on the London Stock Exchange (EXPN) and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 index. (The FTSE 100 index is a share index of the 100 most capitalized companies listed on the London Stock Exchange). Experian Group Limited has corporate headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, and operational headquarters in Costa Mesa, California, and Nottingham, United Kingdom. Experian employs approximately 15,500 people in 36 countries worldwide, supporting clients in more than 65 countries. Annual sales are in excess of $3.8 billion.
For more information, visit the Experian Group's Web site at www.experiangroup.com.
The word "Experian" is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries and is owned by Experian Ltd. and/or its associated companies.
Contact:
Chas Kielt
Senior Director of Marketing
Experian QAS
1 888 322-6201 Telephone
us.press@qas.com Email
Rick Sheehy
Emerge PR
1 617 729-3190 Telephone
rsheehy@emergepr.com Email