Microsoft Power Apps Solution Brings New Level of Precision and Efficiency

ChemTreat LogoHeadquartered in Richmond, Virginia, ChemTreat is one of the largest and fastest-growing industrial water treatment companies in the world.

For over 50 years, ChemTreat has been providing innovative water treatment products and services to commercial, institutional, and industrial customers across a wide range of industries. With solutions that solve the toughest water treatment challenges, the company helps improve customers’ operating efficiency, protect their equipment, and meet environmental and sustainability goals.

Challenge

ChemTreat deploys hundreds of field representatives who, as part of their work, visit customers and potential customers’ sites to provide water quality testing services. The team was conducting water sample collection and ordering test requests through a manual process that involved completing a paper form for each water analysis test before shipping them to the ChemTreat labs with the water samples to be tested. Recurrent problems for the lab included test requests being unclear due to handwriting, mislabeled samples, and multiple samples and test requests in one shipment with no way to tell which test went with which sample. Additionally, the sales team would often have trouble recollecting their test requests since they did not have access to the original paper form they sent to the lab.

ChemTreat knew it was time to digitally transform this manual process and reached out to our team for the engagement based on their positive experience with a previous Power BI reporting project we had supported.

Project

Our goal was to develop an application that allowed the sales team to order water quality tests through a digital submission process to the lab and to store the data for each water sample and test request in a database. The new system would allow for the collection of important data including the sales representative, requested tests, customer information, date and time of sample collections, and location of sample collection with photos and geolocation. The application would also allow the sales representative to print labels with bar codes for each sample container that, when received by the lab, could be scanned and the specific test order would automatically be displayed within the lab software.

Solution

Our team started with an extensive analysis and workflow review of the test submission process. Based on our assessment, we designed a visual workflow within Microsoft Power Apps, working through the water sample test order process with model data to test for efficiency and close any gaps before beginning active development of the new system.

"Marathon's expertise in digital solutions has set a new benchmark for service in the water treatment industry, helping ChemTreat lead with technology that's as advanced as their commitment to quality."

Abby Morris, MS - Manager, Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence

During the model testing, we collaborated with a focus group of lab technicians and sales representatives to collect user feedback to ensure the new process aligned with their range of use cases.

The Marathon team developed the Power Apps workflows with a custom connector to integrate with their SQL Server database. We also developed several custom APIs to manage the data transfers between the sales team submission application and the lab system.

Working with the ChemTreat team, we fully supported the deployment and rollout of the new Power Apps system for the sales representatives, including training and documentation. During the initial launch into production, we also collected feedback from the users to make more usability enhancements to the application.

Results

When looking at expected ROI, we originally projected a minimum cost reduction of $1.00 per water sample test submission, which, based on the average number of samples submitted in a year, would equate to approximately $300,000 in savings for the company. As it turned out, the cost efficiency far surpassed expectations, saving both the sales representatives and lab technicians hours of time previously lost through the old manual process.

Through this new system and the comprehensive data sets now available, ChemTreat can better understand their current and potential customers’ needs and requirements to provide more tailored solutions. With accurate tracking of water samples and tests, the sales teams have complete insight into their customers’ history, and with the streamlined digital system for water quality test orders, representatives in the field can submit more tests in less time.

Features

Notable features of the application include:

  • Printed bar codes for each water sample
  • Geolocation capture for each water sample
  • Previous test order history
  • Creation of new test orders based off historical data