Nisbets cooks up the greatest customer experience on Microsoft 365

A recipe for success

Nisbets is a leading multinational omni-channel distributor to the professional hospitality sector. By making catering equipment simple for its customers through its market-leading blend of choice in product range, price and shopping channel, quality and service, Nisbets has established a reputation for industry excellence over the last 40 years. 

Since its establishment in 1983, Nisbets has grown to 2,000 colleagues and now reaches over half a million customers in more than 100 countries worldwide. To continue to deliver on its goal of making the customer experience the best it possibly can, Nisbets saw the need for cutting-edge technology to underpin its business processes. That’s why it implemented Microsoft 365 across its operations.

“The beauty of Microsoft 365 is its range of collaborative tools,” explains Matthew Batts, Global Head of Technology at Nisbets. “Aside from the security that being cloud-based brings, deploying Microsoft 365 lets us share mailboxes, calendars, contacts and edit documents in real time… We’ve been able to modernise our infrastructure and change the way we collaborate as a business together.” 
 

Working better together makes for better results

By connecting colleagues across the business with a common, cloud-based platform featuring the best productivity and collaboration tools, Nisbets has enabled a truly joined-up, efficient and productive workforce. Colleagues can collaborate more easily in cross-functional teams, across regions and across all aspects of working life – whether working in retail, warehouse or office-based.  
 

“We replaced our old on-premises phone system with Microsoft 365 and installed a modern, cloud-based telephony solution with Microsoft Teams as the frontend,” explains Caroline Shears, Contact Centre Manager at Nisbets. “Microsoft Teams has also become the key enabler for what has become our hybrid working model.” 
 

“Underpinning the collaborative aspect of Teams, SharePoint is an integral tool that allows users to collaborate on documents in real time,” adds Matthew Batts. 
 

Before the pandemic, the contact centre was 100% office based. Now, thanks to its technology choices colleagues enjoy a flexible working model in which Nisbets can operate a seamless colleague and customer experience. Following deployment, the contact centre has enjoyed its best ever results, with a 74 percent reduction in the time it takes to answer a call. As a result, 86 percent of calls were answered in 20 seconds or less. Average answer time fell from 64 seconds to just 16 seconds. As a result, call abandonment rate dropped to just two percent – delivering a better experience for colleagues and customers.

Catering for customers with the greatest CX

Nisbets also makes use of Microsoft Teams in its digital kitchen, an online showcase in which chefs, customers and colleagues can connect, share and learn. Customers can join live Teams calls to learn about new pieces of equipment and Nisbets can share these recorded presentations on its social media channels.
 

In this way, Nisbets is using Microsoft 365 to create a great customer experience. Peter Sephton explains, “We’re making ourselves easy to do business with through any channel – via our market-leading websites, via the phone or via our catalogue.” 

“Microsoft 365 has transformed our contact centre already and it’s crucial to our plans moving forward,” agrees Caroline Shears. “It’s helping us work more closely with our colleagues and serve our customers better.”