Peerless Finds Linux

Companies rely on technology for marketing, human resources, supply chain and numerous other applications, and as a rule, executives understand the tasks these singular tools execute and comprehend their cost-cutting benefits.

But when it comes to the core of mission-critical computing, the very operating systems that make everything go, many companies don’t have a clue about the costs or benefits of options like SUSE Linux Enterprise or UNIX Operating System.

“If you look at the garment industry, most of the industry has less than 1 percent of an IT budget,” says Joffrey Bienvenue, IT infrastructure and operations manager for Peerless Clothing, the largest domestic producer of men’s fine-tailored clothing in the United States. “We have to be a bit more creative and try to find ways to save money.”

The Peerless IT Story
Peerless works with labels like Calvin Klein, DKNY, Bill Blass and Sean John, designing and manufacturing suits and paying royalties to the labels. Peerless must follow label specifications, “the type of fabric we will use, the style,” Bienvenue says. “Most of our production is done overseas, and so one of our challenges right now is collaboration with our factory.”

Bienvenue says some 200 components go into an order that is communicated from the Canadian home base to the factory overseas. About 50 percent of the orders are typical in-stock store items; the other half is booking orders made specifically for individual customers.

As the value-added services differ from store to store, “All that information has to be carried to our factories in China, India or Vietnam,” Bienvenue says. “It’s a lot of work.”

In 2003, Peerless was making about 40,000 suits a week; today, the company imports some 120,000 a week. “As we were doing 100 percent production, we were always trying to find ways to lower costs and diminish waste,” Bienvenue says. “I was looking at my environment and getting frustrated by the low discount” he was receiving on hardware. “I always found that hardware was expensive.”

Peerless implemented the SUSE Linux Enterprise and, as a result, was able to run more hardware for less and isolate servers for maintenance without interruption — all with a 30 percent improvement in speed.

Novell, a leading provider of infrastructure software, and IT consultancy firm Adaris Technologies assisted the Peerless implementation.

Linux Popularity
Jacques Sauve, president and CEO of Adaris, says a lot of companies like Peerless are noticing the trend of college students graduating with an understanding of Linux.

“They’re not just teaching them Windows,” Sauve says. “They’re also doing quite a bit of Linux. Kids coming out of school know Linux and love working with it. The resources are out there if you’re looking for good Linux administrators and people who want to work with the operating system.”

Sauve says companies appreciate the Novell support system. “I have failed to find a support website that is as well made as Novell’s,” he says. “You search a couple of keywords in there and 99 percent of the time you’ll find the answer you’re looking for in the first page.”

Kerry Kim, product marketing manager for SUSE Linux Enterprise at Novell, says Linux has good retail adoption because of partnerships with the likes of IBM and point-of-service solutions.

“Most companies aren’t going to risk replacing whole sections of their IT infrastructure just to implement a brand new open source solution,” Kim says. “They’ll take something that they have and add to it, and over time continue to improve that.”

Novell has tried to focus on interoperability, making the software compatible with retail solutions. “This also goes back to the support relationships that we have with technology companies like SAP, Microsoft and VMware,” Kim says. “You have that assurance that the companies that make up that entire solution pack are standing behind you.”

Bienvenue agrees. By deploying its SAP environment on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, Peerless Clothing has saved $700,000 and consolidated hardware by 90 percent.

“Since Novell is all on Linux, their e-mail system, their file and print, their portal and calibration, I can change my setup if I need to work on an SAP system or a group-wide system,” he says. “That simplifies a lot of the maintenance and the training.”