AAA Wholesale
Case Study
AAA Wholesale is a leading wholesaler of general merchandise and Food & Beverage products headquartered in New York with additional locations in Connecticut, New Jersey, and Tennessee. The company offers a broad range of products, including fresh produce, meat, packaged goods, beverages, candy, over-the-counter medicines, electronics accessories, and batteries.
AAA Wholesale serves customers through a combination of retail stores, an online shopping platform, and business-to-business (B2B) delivery services.
Their Situation
For more than ten years, AAA Wholesale operated with legacy on-premises ERP and POS systems. The company later transitioned to Microsoft Dynamics NAV & LS Retail software, which initially met their needs. However, as the business grew, and new technologies like AI, mobility, and an advanced Warehouse Management System (WMS) became essential, an upgrade was necessary. Key challenges included:
​
-
High infrastructure maintenance costs.
-
Limited scalability across multiple locations and states.
-
Delayed access to business data.
-
Reduced agility and slower decision-making.
These challenges made it difficult for AAA Wholesale to keep up with changing market demands and offer a seamless shopping experience across all channels. As the company expanded into new markets, increasing customer expectations for smooth, consistent service - both online and in-store - further highlighted the shortcomings of their outdated systems. The company decided to pursue a modern, modular solution that could scale with the business and support smarter, faster operations.
The Implementation
​
AAA Wholesale chose LS Central after reviewing several ERP and POS options, as it unified retail, wholesale, and eCommerce in one platform. LS Central manages sales, inventory, finance, purchasing & customer engagement through a central interface. Its SaaS model o ers flexibility, scalability, and real-time insights for multi-state operations, with modular add-ons like Analytics, Bookings, and Sta Management to expand features as needed. The Optimus team applied its proven Accelerator Methodology to ensure a seamless transition from Microsoft Dynamics NAV and legacy systems to the cloud-based LS Central environment.
The project involved:
​
-
Migrating data and configurations from the existing NAV/LS Retail infrastructure to LS Central SaaS.
-
Integrating warehouse operations, financial management, and retail processes within one centralized platform.
-
Deploying Analytics for LS Central to provide managers with real-time dashboards and insights.
-
Conducting change management and staff training sessions to ensure smooth adoption across departments.
Collaboration between Optimus and AAA Wholesale’s internal teams was a key success factor. Through transparent communication, detailed testing, and user-oriented workshops, the implementation achieved rapid adoption and immediate operational impact.
The Solution​
​
AAA Wholesale evaluated several ERP and POS solutions, but identified LS Central as the only platform that could successfully combine POS, inventory management, financials, and eCommerce in a single, centralized system. The decision to implement LS Central was determined by several key features, including the ability to:
​
-
Streamline operations across departments and locations.
-
Deliver real-time analytics to support quicker, more informed decisions through the Analytics for LS Central add-on.
-
Run as Software as a Service (SaaS), reducing costly on-premises infrastructure.
​
Local LS Retail partner, Optimus Business Transformation, led the implementation. With strong collaboration and effective change management, the rollout was smooth and quickly adopted by employees
Benefits
​
The company observed the benefits soon after going live. The automatic updates in LS Central SaaS have reduced IT costs and enhanced security, allowing the IT team to focus on innovation and business growth instead of managing infrastructure. At the same time, LS Central has significantly improved AAA Wholesale’s operations by:
​
-
Providing a comprehensive, real-time view of inventory, sales, and customer data across the business.
-
Ensuring inventory updates instantly sync across all sales channels, enabling faster order fulfillment, more accurate inventory management, and greater operational efficiency.
-
Equipping employees with intuitive interfaces and automated workflows that reduce manual errors and boost productivity.
-
Giving managers immediate access to critical insights, enabling faster customer service and data-driven decisions.
Collaboration between Optimus and AAA Wholesale’s internal teams was a key success factor. Through transparent communication, detailed testing, and user-oriented workshops, the implementation achieved rapid adoption and immediate operational impact.
​
Since implementing LS Central, AAA Wholesale has achieved:
-
40% reduction on IT maintenance hours.
-
Sales reporting time cut from 2 hours to under 5 minutes.
-
25% decrease in warehouse staffing needs due to automation.
-
Faster decision-making driven by real-time data access.
-
Improved inventory accuracy across stores and the central warehouse.
-
Stronger loss prevention at checkout.
-
Better traceability and visibility of inventory at every stage.
The company now plans to explore the full potential of LS Central and its powerful add-ons, including Bookings for LS Central, eCommerce for LS Central, and Sta Management for LS Central.
“Migrating to LS Central SaaS has freed up our IT team to focus on projects that truly drive business value, rather than just keeping the lights on. Being on the cloud has also given us the advantage of accessing real-time data whenever we need it.”
AAA Wholesale Leadership Team.
