Case Study: Northern Monk Brewery

About Northern Monk Brewery

Based in Holbeck, Leeds, Northern Monk Brewery first opened its doors in 2014, using traditional monastic brewing values to create the highest quality beers, now marketed and enjoyed worldwide. A progressive approach to ingredients and techniques helps the company to create the very best beer experiences, and Northern Monk was recently named one of the UK’s best small companies by the Sunday Times.

Matching individual user requirements

PCM Systems has provided IT support for Northern Monk Brewery since 2016. This is a business which has grown quickly and organically, and its telephone system, which consisted of individual landlines with separate numbers for each site, had been outgrown by a strong and dynamic business seeking to portray a more professional image to its customers and suppliers.

The organisation wanted to introduce a flexible and integrated system enabling suppliers to access head office functions as well as enabling customers to book tables in bars, as well as creating a quick, easy and reliable way for staff to contact each other, both on the same site and between locations.

Scoping the project

PCM Systems began by scoping the requirement to identify what Northern Monk Brewery wanted to achieve with the new system and to see where added value could be built in, based on the agreed parameters. The objective was to establish who needed an extension, defining the size of the network, and to provide best value for money solution at a low capital cost but with significant functionality and potential for expansion into the future.

Flexibility was also a driver; these are creative people who wanted a real input to the finished product, with the ability to add individual touches such as recording their own ‘on hold’ music.

The changeover was managed without any interruption to business processes. All equipment was preconfigured by PCM before going out to the three sites, where it was installed by PCM engineers with the old system still up and running. PCM managed the transfer of the original numbers, with outgoing calls switched on first and then incoming calls incorporated, ensuring the changeover was carefully planned to match business processes.

An evolving business tool

The Cloud-based telephone system developed by PCM has completely changed telephone communications for Northern Monk Brewery. Today, around half the staff operate with a telephone handset, whilst others use a mobile app. The system is essentially flexible, providing out of office access, interactive voice response (IVR), integration with the company’s CRM system and call queuing where the phone lines are busy. All internal calls and calls between sites are free of charge.

The system is managed by PCM for Northern Monk Brewery, which means the company pays an ongoing fee for maintenance, changes and upgrades but is not tied in to a calls package with a lengthy contract. PCM is currently building in added functionalities to match new identified business requirements.