Lindemann Chimney Co. recently relaunched its digital business to meet growing demand from online buyers.

The manufacturer and distributor of fireplace and chimney components, which also handles service calls, projects about $14 million in business-to-business e-commerce revenue, up 27.3% from $11 million in 2015. This online sales increase reflects just one aspect of Lindemann’s recent growth, Dave Ullmann, director of e-commerce, told attendees last week at the 2016 NetSuite SuiteWorld conference held in San Jose, Calif.

During the past eight years, Lindemann has expanded its number of service trucks to 40 from four and its number of distribution centers to four from one. The company’s Atlanta, Chicago, New York City and San Francisco-based distribution centers now allow Lindemann to supply parts in two days or less to 95% of customers located in the contiguous United States via ground shipping. Lindemann has also expanded its service offerings to include gutter cleaning, masonry repair and fireplace cleaning and repair.

These new offerings have contributed to 30% year-over-year sales growth at Lindemann over the past three years, Ullmann said. Prior to the e-commerce site’s March 1 relaunch, however, less than 1% of these sales were processed online at LindemannChimneySupply.com. Lindemann also sells through the Amazon.com marketplace.

Lindemann’s e-commerce site previously operated on technology from Magento Inc., which connected to five QuickBooks financial applications. But the e-commerce and financial software was difficult to integrate, and as customers placed orders online and as Lindemann added new products or pricing to its online product catalog, it was unable to update inventory availability and pricing on LindemannChimneySupply.com more often than once each night, Ullmann said.

Lindemann also used customer relationship management software from Salesforce.com Inc. to manage the service side of its business, scheduling customer appointments and deliveries, providing customers with price estimates, and managing records of customer activity. Lindemann employees had to rekey data nightly from Salesforce to the QuickBooks files. “Rekeying into QuickBooks created a major issue with customer data,” Ullmann said. “35% of customers were duplicated across our different systems. Our sales data was a mess.”

Lindemann in October 2015 decided to digitally restructure its business to better organize its customer, sales and product information. The company hired NetSuite Professional Services to deploy both the SuiteCommerce Advanced e-commerce platform and NetSuite enterprise resource planning, or ERP system, which the company uses to organize information on inventory, financial information and customer activity

NetSuite Professional Services deployed the new ERP system within three months, and integrated it with the e-commerce software before LindemannChimneySupply.com officially relaunched on March 1, 2016.

Lindemann’s four distribution centers and third-party logistics providers are now connected to the NetSuite system. The NetSuite system also integrates with Amazon.com, so Lindemann employees can manage products listed on the marketplace  through NetSuite.  The integration of the ERP and e-commerce software lets customers view up-to-date information on inventory, pricing and shipping times, as well as personal order history. They can also pay invoices and designate workflow for approving purchases among buyers’ supervisors. Designated procurement professionals can set spending limits for individual accounts and buyers, set up authorization workflows and track orders by their own account codes.

Lindemann has also decided to abandon its relationship with Salesforce, and is currently building a system on NetSuite that field service employees can use on their iPads, Ullmann said. This application will include scheduling, custom forms, quotes, customer information and other service features. “I’ve built 90% of that system myself, it doesn’t involve heavy coding,” Ullmann said. “It’s a month-long project, and costs less than a quarter of what we pay Salesforce in a year.” Ullmann declined to comment on the cost of deploying NetSuite software. NetSuite says its e-commerce software starts at about $1,600 per month and is adjusted upward based on the type of installation and the number of users.

Following the relaunch, Lindemann projects online business orders will grow to 10% of total sales in 2016, up from less than 1% on the old system.

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