The Book Service (TBS) is the book distribution arm for leading UK publisher The Random House Group and is the UK’s leading trade book distributor. TBS distributes books for its parent Random House Group and also for a number of well known third party UK book distributors including Virgin, Little Brown, the AA, Faber and Faber and Lonely Planet books. The division plays a crucial role for the UK’s publishing industry – with over 24 percent of UK trade publications distributed by them every year.
The distribution division operates using four warehouses across Britain. The three warehouses at Colchester, Grantham and Wellingborough distribute the books while its returns warehouse is located in Manningtree. TBS operates 24 hours a day between Monday and Saturday to deliver books to key High Street retailers including WH Smith, Waterstones and Books etc. Working together, the distributor’s warehouses send out a phenomenal 100 million books per year across the UK and globally, comprising up to 45,000 different titles.
From Green Screens to the Web
At the forefront of book distribution in the UK, TBS has continuously invested in technology, allowing it to improve service, maximize efficiency and minimize cost. A key part of their service is their core ERP solution called Vista which has formed the backbone of the organization’s IT systems for nearly 30 years. Within Vista, users were required to access information via green screens.
As the demand from customers grew and the subsequent volume of books that TBS needed to distribute increased, a replacement for the old green screens application was required. It needed a web-based system that was easy to view and use and which could easily be accessed remotely by clients based at home or on the road.
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