Houston Food Bank Selects NetSuite to Help Fight Hunger

NetSuite Helps Nonprofit Organization Expand Operations as it Fights Food Insecurity Exacerbated by the COVID-19 Pandemic

AUSTIN, Texas, March 17, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- The Houston Food Bank, the nation's largest food bank in distribution, has selected Oracle NetSuite to help support its rapid expansion as it works to meet increases in demand for food and other essentials. With NetSuite, the Houston Food Bank will unify financial planning, order management, and warehouse logistics into a singular system to help give greater visibility and control into its operations and scale its programs that currently help more than one million people fight food insecurity.

Founded in 1982, the Houston Food Bank is a member of Feeding America and serves 18 counties in Houston and southeast Texas, distributing more than 150 million pounds of food annually through a network of 1,600 partners. To meet growing demand since the beginning of the global pandemic, the Houston Food Bank has increased distributions by 20 percent and as it scaled its operations, its current ERP system struggled to keep up. This led to inventory tracking issues, increased time spent on cycle counts, and slower fulfillment. To address these challenges and create more efficient operations so that it can help more people, the Houston Food Bank replaced its legacy ERP system with NetSuite.

"When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, we had to rethink how we operated for the safety of all involved. We mobilized and set up neighborhood drive-through super sites to distribute food in larger quantities more efficiently, while maintaining safe distances," said Casey Ferrell, senior director of information technology, Houston Food Bank. "As we scaled operations and revamped our processes, the inefficiencies of our ERP system became more pronounced. We made the switch to NetSuite because we knew we needed one unified system that could integrate data from across our business and automate our critical processes. NetSuite will give us the real-time visibility and insights needed in one central location to help support our growth trajectory and allow us to continue helping more Texans."

With NetSuite, Houston Food Bank will be able to take advantage of an integrated business system to adapt and scale its core operations. NetSuite will enable Houston Food Bank to process orders faster through a new online ordering portal, while granting partners greater visibility and flexibility into their orders. Additionally, NetSuite inventory management will enable warehouse staff to cut down on cycle counts and more easily move and track product around the warehouse. Finally, by helping to eliminate manual processes across finance and operations, NetSuite will enable volunteers to spend more time identifying people in need and scaling home delivery operations in a way that caters to the dietary and cultural needs of those it serves.

"We are incredibly proud to work with organizations like the Houston Food Bank that make a positive difference in the world every day," said Sam Levy, SVP of sales, Oracle NetSuite. "With NetSuite, the Houston Food Bank has one system of record to manage data from across critical business functions, putting it in a stronger position as it works toward its ultimate vision of a world without food insecurity."

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SOURCE Oracle NetSuite