I want to place an order but your office is shut

The company: Whaley's-Bradford Ltd
The story: A small investment for a textiles company with 50% export customers lets clients order when they want to

You don't have to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds to make your business benefit from the internet. West Yorkshire-based textiles business Whaley's-Bradford invested a relatively small amount of cash to make life easier for its customers.

Lorraine Riley, is the person who was handed the brief for running the system by the company directors. She says that the main thinking behind going online was to make life easier for the company's customers, particularly the 50% who were export customers, so that they could order when they wanted, rather than when the business had someone to answer the phones.

The company initially was £7,000 which gave it a basic transactional website. The success of recently led it to spend the same amount again and add new features.

Now, in addition to on-line sales, the focus is on customer service and making the fulfillment of export orders more efficient for the business.

The system has software which automatically generates export documentation, once an order is placed, cutting down on the need for paperwork. Alongside this, software provided by the company's chosen international carrier DHL generates the necessary shipping documents while also offering customers the facility to track and traces the progress of their orders online.

"DHL has provided us with a fully interactive trading system, which keeps customers up to date with what's happening," says Riley. UK carrier Amtrak operates a similar facility for domestic orders.

For Whaley's-Bradford, the migration online hasn't been about trying to grow a new channel but offering another alternative to phone and fax for their customers.

"We are all about customer service and we think this is boosting customer loyalty. We have examples of former customers coming back to us, because of our online presence."