Allstate Peterbilt Group, the largest privately held heavy truck dealership group in the upper Midwest, with 26 locations across the region, exemplifies the critical significance of network reliability in today’s business environment. With a steadfast commitment to providing exceptional sales, parts, and service to their home and business customers, Allstate Peterbilt’s workforce relies on seamless connectivity to ensure uninterrupted operations.
Network Connectivity: The Backbone of Operational Excellence
For Allstate Peterbilt, reliable connectivity is the lifeblood of their business operations. Their entire business model, including point-of-sale, inventory management, and service ticketing systems, is hosted in the cloud, making a stable internet connection a critical necessity.
Furthermore, with a significant portion of their parts sales occurring over the phone, any disruption in connectivity can severely impact their ability to effectively serve customers.
Allstate Peterbilt relies on Bigleaf to support the core of their business operations:
- Point of sale
- Inventory management
- Service tickets
- Office 365
- VoIP
Overcoming Connectivity Challenges in Rural Areas
Allstate Peterbilt’s widespread presence across the Midwest, including rural areas with limited internet service provider (ISP) options, presented significant connectivity challenges. Many of their locations, particularly in the Dakotas, could only access a single reliable internet circuit, leaving them vulnerable to frequent outages and downtime.
This not only impacted their ability to conduct business but also created frustrating situations where ISPs would often point the blame back at them, leaving Allstate Peterbilt’s IT team to navigate the complexity of resolving issues that may or may not have been within their actual power to solve.
Bigleaf: A Game Changing Solution for Network Reliability
Through their longtime partners at Fostar, Inc., Allstate Peterbilt discovered Bigleaf, and that’s when their connectivity challenges began getting addressed with remarkable efficacy. By leveraging Bigleaf’s intelligent SD-WAN solution, Allstate Peterbilt gained the ability to seamlessly combine multiple internet circuits, including fiber, cable, and cellular connections, providing redundancy and failover capabilities. The change was like night and day.
Simplicity and Proactive Monitoring: Key Advantages
One of the key advantages Allstate Peterbilt experienced with Bigleaf is its simplicity and proactive monitoring capabilities. Wuotila praised the ease of setup and management, “I didn’t even have to go to the sites. I could call and walk them [my team] through it. So that’s how easy it was when I have part-Sales guys that can do it.”
The Bigleaf Web Dashboard now plays a pivotal role in Allstate Peterbilt’s proactive approach to network management. Wuotila explained, “I usually have the Web Dashboard open and when I see a site highlighted yellow, I can click on it. It’ll show me one circuit’s down but our users don’t even know yet because your same-IP failover has already rerouted the traffic to another circuit. That lets me call it in and get that repaired without the end user even noticing there was a problem. I also get quick alert notifications any time a site is having any issue. That’s a huge plus.”
Wireless Connectivity: Enhancing Reliability in Underserved Areas
To further bolster their network reliability, especially in areas with limited connectivity options, Allstate Peterbilt has leveraged Verizon cellular circuits for backup. Bigleaf allows them to do this easily and allows for a cost-effective and flexible backup option, ensuring uninterrupted operations even in the most remote locations.
“It’s absolutely crucial for us to have different flavors of connectivity because we can’t always get a hardline connection,” Wuotila explained. “We have such eclectic locations, from metro areas with millions of people to places that barely have a post office. To have another tool for backup is really great.”
The Bigleaf Web Dashboard now plays a pivotal role in Allstate Peterbilt’s proactive approach to network management. Wuotila explained, “I usually have the Web Dashboard open and when I see a site highlighted yellow, I can click on it. It’ll show me one circuit’s down but our users don’t even know yet because your same-IP failover has already rerouted the traffic to another circuit. That lets me call it in and get that repaired without the end user even noticing there was a problem. I also get quick alert notifications any time a site is having any issue. That’s a huge plus.”
Bigleaf Wireless Connect
Bigleaf Wireless Connect offers the convenience of adding wireless connectivity to your Bigleaf service, providing a reliable, single-vendor solution for uninterrupted business operations.
Transforming Business Operations with Bigleaf
Bigleaf enabled Allstate Peterbilt to transform their business operations, achieving unparalleled network reliability and continuity. With outages reduced to a minimum, Allstate Peterbilt can now focus on delivering exceptional service to their customers, secure in the knowledge that their network infrastructure is resilient and adaptable.
Wuotila summed up the impact of Bigleaf, “As soon as you install a circuit, it’s displaying in the Web Dashboard within minutes. You can see each circuit up, your speed, how much bandwidth is being used at that moment.”
Unlock the Potential of Bigleaf
Elevate your business operations and achieve unparalleled network reliability with Bigleaf. Leverage intelligent SD-WAN solutions, proactive monitoring, and flexible connectivity options to ensure uninterrupted operations, even in the most challenging environments.
Contact Bigleaf today to learn how their innovative solutions can transform your network infrastructure.
Main Challenges
- Limited internet availability
- Constant outages
and downtime - Different ISPs at multiple locations
- Unresponsive ISPs
and waiting games
Bigleaf Delivers
- Aggregating multiple ISP connections
- Easy and intuitive setup process
- “Single pane of glass” view for all circuits
Final Results
- Elimination of service outages
- High performing internet, even in rural and limited-service areas
- Issue resolution with no user impact
