The Context: How does one translate a customer service experience from one that requires a representative on a telephone to the internet without loosing the personal touch that has made a company known for its excellent customer relations? How does one integrate this new sales flow into their legacy sales system? How do you encourage long term customers to move from the traditional methods of dealing with the company to the web in order to reduce costs without alienating them and risking their business?

The Client: With over seventeen locations in Manhattan, Manhattan Mini Storage is the single largest provider of storage services within New York City, serving over 200,000 customers. Along with providing extra space to New Yorkers with too small closets, Manhattan Mini Storage also provides a range of services from moving to the sales of packing supplies. To connect this business, Manhattan Mini Storage uses a legacy AS/400 system to manage everything from their customer relationships to their available room and supply inventory. Additionally, each location has its own revenue reconciliation so that each customer's bill is credited to that location's monthly income. Lastly, Manhattan Mini Storage is known around the country for its lively marketing campaigns and distinctive brand.

The Problem: Manhattan Mini Storage realized that their old "brochure-ware" website was not bringing in any revenue and was alienating potential future customers, increasingly used to transacting their business online. While the in-house IT team had a diverse set of skills aimed at supporting the Edison Properties, the parent company, infrastructure, they lacked the specialized skill set for developing a world class web application.

Manhattan Mini Storage looked repeatedly for a consulting team that would not only help translate their business into a model that could be replicated online but to also bring their distinctive brand to the web. Additionally, they would wanted a team that could work closely with their IT staff and help train them in internet technologies. After a long search, they could neither find one that had the skills necessary for the job and the ability to do it within the budget allocated.

"Several of the firms we looked at had the creative team to translate our brand or the technical skills to do what we needed but few had both," said Michael Johnson, General Manager of the Manhattan Mini Storage division of Edison Properties. "And none were within our budget."

The Solution: "When 42 Solutions presented their plan for our web application, we knew these were the guys for us," said Mr. Johnson. "They not only knew and loved our brand but had a clear vision of the process necessary to bring our business to the web."

Working closely with the senior managers at Manhattan Mini Storage, 42 Solutions partners Daniel Kellner and Colin Ferm hashed out a detailed set of requirements before the application construction began.

"The original specification was three pages long," said Mr. Ferm. "After a series of meeting in which we went back and forth, covering every area of their business, we ended up with a fifty page set of requirements to work from."

In the meantime, Daniel Kellner worked closely with the Manhattan Mini Storage marketing team to migrate the latest campaign into an interactive format.

"Working on an initial design is an iterative process," said Mr. Kellner. "It first requires an attempt at translating the brand into a basic look and feel that is both easy to use and easily identifiable as being the same company as offline."

With the new requirements document, Colin Ferm was able to begin planning out the behind the scenes architecture of the application. This required choosing a technology that was flexible enough to build a site as well as integrate with the legacy IBM AS/400 environment. Since Edison Properties had no web standards, 42 Solutions was also charged with implementing those as well.

A Java, J2EE application architecture was chosen for its multi-platform integration abilities. To speed development, 42 Solutions also used open source libraries including Struts and Hibernate.

"We leveraged these open source projects because they allowed us to concentrate on what was important," said Mr. Ferm. "Implementing the business rules."

Once the business was modeled in the application code and the design was finalized, 42 Solutions began a frenzied period of integrating the two. "Every day we had something new to show them," said Mr. Kellner. "And every day they saw their business taking form in a new medium."

"As the web application came together," said Mr. Ferm. "We could feel their excitement grow."

"I don't know when I was sure we were on to something," said Mr. Johnson. "But there was a point when I was testing the application and realized that our business was going to grow in ways even we hadn't been expecting."

The Result: After launching in the summer of 2003, Manhattan Mini Storage saw 17% of its new customers come in through the new sales channel in the first month. Additionally, customers could now maintain their accounts, pay their bills, and signup for reoccurring payments online, saving money on a continuing monthly basis.