Rick Schmitt’s Success Story: Celebrating 20+ Years of Partnership

Rick Schmitt has relied on Tri-Tech's intelligent POS system to keep his companies, The Bike Shack and The Shoe Shack, running smoothly for more than 20 years. Having grown his businesses substantially since 2001 with our integrated solutions, Rick exemplifies the ultimate Tri-Tech success story and inspires other organizations to realize their full potential.

“Running two businesses with one accounting and inventory management system made my life as an owner and manager very simple,” Rick says. “I can track the data of each entity separately or combined as one unit. Plus, I get my financial statements on demand with one click.”

The AIM system is especially valuable for businesses that provide unique services like Rick’s, such as rentals, repairs and maintenance. However, it’s often difficult for such companies to balance quality customer service with internal POS operations.

The Bike Shack services hundreds of bikes and fitness equipment on a regular basis, and Tri-Tech software allows technicians to spend their time assisting customers or fixing bikes — not making thousands of phone calls. Now, staff can simply click on the POS system to mark a repair or service as completed, then automatically call, text or email the customer to notify them that their equipment is ready.

“This puts us in a position to continue working on additional repairs or speaking to a customer in the store while also communicating with another customer about their completed service,” Rick explains. “It is not a computer talking to them; it’s a pre-recorded message from our staff.”

And, to accommodate a growing need for e-commerce solutions, our Active-e program connects AIM’s retail and inventory management components to the outside world through a digital storefront updated in real time. This saves Rick and his team hours each week, boosting company-wide efficiency and output.

“I was introduced to Active-e in the fall of 2005. What a great program!” Rick says. “My results have been ten-fold over our previous activity on the web. Active-e gets us to the top of the search engines, and thus, more folks hit our site when looking for products. The online sales are easy to manage, and the site is also very simple to set up."

Rick is glad to have formed a successful business relationship with Tri-Tech over the last two decades, and he still counts on AIM and Active-e's cutting-edge POS technology today.

“Our ability to stay in touch with customers, manage our inventory, deliver the right products, and efficiently operate our service and repair department are all directly related to Tri-Techʼs products and services,” Rick says. “Because of this partnership, our business and website usage have continued to grow year over year.”

See why customers like Rick love the convenient, time-saving features of AIM and Active-e.