Testimonial - Collett Designs

"We needed the added value provided by the professional team at Crestline to make this all happen with minimal disruption to our business."

Greg Collett, Collett Designs Inc., Aurora, Ontario

Collett Designs Inc., founded in 1995 is a leading Internet website design and production company. The company started operations from a home office base and grew rapidly from its inception.

Although closely monitored and controlled, Collett Designs' technology growth, as with many small and start-up ventures, was somewhat opportunistic. As the need arose generated by the growing business, additional hardware, software and networked expansions were added.

By 1999 the company had grown to have six employees, numerous computers online - and business was more than doubling each year! The decision was then made to relocate to new, larger facilities.

At the same time another decision was made by Collett Designs' management, taking advantage of the office relocation as an opportunity window- to review all the company's technological needs and develop a tactical plan to address a growing number of key issues. Understandably, in their fast-paced industry, it was not possible to stop production work while any other system upgrade work was conducted particularly regarding their vital computer requirements. This alone made the project that much more challenging.

Crestline Computer Solutions was retained to provide the technical support and supply the service required to execute the required solutions.

Review
After first conducting an in-depth review and scope of the project requirements and determining weaknesses in the existing Windows 98 network employed, a new Windows NT based plan was developed, reviewed, refined and then executed by Crestline working in conjunction with the Collett Designs' production staff.

Implementation
This project included the following issues and assignments:

Addition of two new computer workstations. Service maintenance on a number of existing workstations. Rewiring the entire office network. Managing remote access links.

Procurement, configuration and set-up of two additional servers. Installation of networked office workflow & communications software. New UPS and backup technology. Operator training. Ongoing system support and maintenance.

The decision recommendation for this extensive project was to base the solution on a Microsoft Small Business Server platform featuring Windows NT software and Microsoft Outlook and Office software. This software is ideally suited to empower all employees integrating their numerous work functions efficiently and effectively. In addition the overall upgrades, when integrated to the Collett Designs production workflow, increased data access and transfer speeds, storage capacity and overall network performance throughout the organization.

Results
Over the course of six weeks the required network wiring and configuration work was done with minimal disruption to the day-to-day operations at Collett Designs. The result for Collett Designs and their customers is an even more robust, dependable, fast and very efficient computer platform capable of handling current and projected workloads.

Said Greg Collett, President, Collett Designs Inc., "Ours is a very fast paced business and, understandably, we and our clients are totally dependent on the quality of the technology that we use, both hardware and software. What impressed us with Crestline's approach to our needs was how they listened well and then systematically addressed each stage of the project. We sourced top quality products from companies such as IBM and Microsoft to meet our business needs with confidence, but that alone was not enough. We needed the value addition provided by the professional team at Crestline to make this all happen with minimal disruption to our business."