Wine and spirit distributor modernizes contract management to improve operational efficiency

The challenge

In 2013, Young’s Holdings owned Young’s Market Company, a 10-state alcohol distribution company that has since been sold to Republic National Distributing Company. Young’s Market Company had no automated systems for its contract management, instead relying on filing cabinets of print records at its various offices. With several locations throughout the West Coast, files were dispersed and managed separately at each office, which made locating a contract a challenging endeavor. “What was most challenging for me was to find a contract and confirm the termination date or provisions in a contract,” said Susan Koch, senior corporate paralegal at Young’s Holdings.

“When I was shown Agiloft, I was immediately able to figure out how to use it. And I said, ‘That’s my pick.’ Agiloft’s ease of use and the fact that I could, without any training, maneuver through the system and figure out how to find a contract was significant.”

– Susan Koch, Senior Corporate Paralegal, Young’s Holdings

“We would have separate distribution agreements with all the different alcohol suppliers, and we would try to have them in template, but there were differences in each agreement. We encountered many challenges regarding diligence.” After Koch joined Young’s Holdings in 2013, she was tasked with performing a comprehensive overview of company records. This work included implementing a contract management system to enable process continuity across the company and improve the ability to locate contract agreements. Prior to looking into automated systems, Koch would manually input contract information from print agreements into Excel spreadsheets. “It was very time-consuming,” she said, adding she often spent half her day tracking down agreements.

The solution

Agiloft implementer Jack Wicks worked with Koch, who served as project manager, on deploying Agiloft CLM. Phase one of the project entailed transitioning from paper records and contracts, with Koch focusing on digitally transitioning distribution agreements. Phase two required enabling Young’s Holdings subsidiaries to deploy and mobilize Agiloft CLM for contract negotiation and management.

Additionally, Young’s Holdings was in the process of looking to sell Young’s Market Company, which required significant diligence work. Koch needed a centralized repository of Young’s Holdings agreements where she could store and locate the records she needed to provide in the future as part of the due diligence processes.

“Our executives often mention Agiloft in their emails. They don’t refer to it as our contract management tool. They’re very proud of it because they see what it’s done for the company. They throw the name out like it’s a coworker, not a tool…’Agiloft will get that for you.”

– Susan Koch, Senior Corporate Paralegal, Young’s Holdings

“I’ve been a paralegal for over 40 years and have done my share of diligence for transactions. I could not conceive how I could do something like that without Agiloft to get all the agreements,” Koch said. “Agiloft gave me hope that I could pull off this project because I now had a central spot to keep all these records, sort them, and figure out where I was missing agreements. That was a lifesaver for me.”

While the Agiloft deployment timeline was estimated to require six months, Young’s Holdings successfully deployed Agiloft CLM in approximately two months.

“Jack was fantastic walking me through the deployment process,” Koch said. “He really understood contract management and explained what Agiloft could easily do, which was extremely helpful to keep me on task and steered toward a feasible goal. If he didn’t understand contract flows, we would’ve wasted a lot of time.”

The impact

Since implementing Agiloft CLM, Young’s Holdings’ legal, procurement and marketing teams are accomplishing more work than ever before, completing larger volumes of work in less time.

The company leverages Agiloft for managing distribution contracts and ensuring compliance regulations are met. It sends notification emails when contracts are about to expire and need to be renewed, saving the legal team from having to renegotiate an agreement. Agiloft is also used by the company’s real estate team to send alerts when lease agreements are set to expire, allowing real estate teams to begin negotiations sooner rather than later.

Prior to using Agiloft, Koch says it was standard to have a partially executed agreement, which no longer happens. Agreements are flagged when signatures and expiration dates are needed.

Koch touts Agiloft for the significant time-savings it allows. “I used to spend half my day looking for agreements. Now, I spend less than five minutes because the search is so fast. That frees up half my day,” she said.

As Young’s Holdings has reevaluated its marketing agreements for the coming year, Agiloft has helped with streamlining reporting to inform marketing decisions. Young’s Holdings is also revisiting how it will use Agiloft in the coming year and looking into further integrations.

“I know we want to integrate Agiloft with Microsoft Teams because we use Teams for internal discussions,” Koch said. “Our accounting department is also looking into how they can integrate Agiloft with their systems. Our head of AP loves Agiloft because every time she gets a new vendor, she looks them up in Agiloft to see if we have an agreement. If we don’t, she flags it to me. She would like to integrate it more with her systems to save time on her end.”

Company leadership has noticed the benefits and ROI that Agiloft has delivered as well.

“Our executives often mention Agiloft in their emails,” Koch said. “They don’t refer to it as our contract management tool. They’re very proud of it because they see what it’s done for the company. They throw the name out like it’s a coworker, not a tool…Agiloft will get that for you.”

While the benefits have been many, the biggest for Koch is undisputable. “I can find agreements in minutes,” she said. “That, to me, is phenomenal.”

Challenges

Paper-based contract system made
contract review and retrieval a manual process

Files decentralized across several locations

Inability to quickly review contracts for termination dates, provisions, or compliance

Manual reporting process that impacted
ability to quickly report to leadership

Benefits

Completely digital and centralized contract management repository that is easy to use

Custom workflows streamline key contracting processes and templates

Automated notifications ensure efficient
and accurate contract negotiation and full
lifecycle management

Teams accomplish more work than ever,
completing larger volumes of work in less time

Total contract compliance management

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