Torre Tribout, President of Nomad, took a homegrown software solution made for his mother’s decorative pillow company and created a revolutionary new B2B eCommerce platform: Nomad eCommerce.

Transforming a Pillow Business into a Global Competitor

In 1998, at age 19, Torre Tribout was restless. “I became bored with life, seeing the same people and the same scenery. It was time for a change.” A finance major at the University of Missouri who had lived in the St. Louis area all his life, Torre thought a semester studying abroad in London would offer some new inspiration.

And this is where fortune smiled on Torre. He was introduced to the head of sales in the London office for Merrill Lynch, who invited him to work on a trial basis on the trading floor in London.

“Being in a brand new environment amongst tough, Ivy League-level competition motivated me. I felt that I had to work harder than everyone else to get noticed, and that feeling drove me to succeed,” says Torre.

Hard work paid off, and Torre was offered a summer internship with Merrill Lynch in Europe. Out of the 40 or so students in the program, only a few would secure a permanent position. Torre’s dedication paid off again, and he was among the chosen few.

Launching Caroline Cole, Inc.

Fresh off this major disappointment and with no real prospects, Torre found himself back in St. Louis–where his mother mentioned her idea of starting a decorative pillow business. “My mom had been thinking about starting a pillow company for some time. When she brought it up again, I said, ‘Ok, let’s do it, and I’ll run the business.’” And so, in 2000, Caroline Cole, Inc., a manufacturer of high-end decorative pillows–and an entrepreneur–was born.

From Wandering Nomad to Manufacturing Entrepreneur

"Believe it or not, there was actually quite a good market for these high-end decorative pillows," says Torre. "The first trade show we attended was in Atlanta, where our small 8ft by 8ft booth sold $20,000 worth of pillows."

As a just-in-time manufacturing business, Caroline Cole produced its pillows once an order was received. This required the precise management of materials and staff to meet on-demand production. With an average of 5 different fabrics per pillow and 50 yards of fabric each, forecasting sales and material requirements was no small feat.

Caroline Cole soon expanded its sales and sewing teams. The product catalog grew to 400 pillow designs, continuously refreshed to keep up with changing trends and demand. "We switched out 30-40 designs every 6-8 weeks, so our catalog had to change too. Each catalog cost about $2 to print, and we reprinted every time we updated designs."

While new product lines were created and pillows produced, the Caroline Cole sales team was on the road taking orders. The constant change in product lines and challenges in communicating inventory and availability led to more issues.

"The sales team would tell customers that items were in stock when they weren't, or sell discontinued items because they didn't have up-to-date information. They’d promise a shipment at a certain time, and we couldn’t keep that promise."

To manage its accounting processes, Caroline Cole was using Peachtree Accounting software. "At the time, Peachtree Accounting and QuickBooks were the common accounting software tools for small businesses. But they weren't built to handle all of our needs and had shortcomings in terms of manufacturing and inventory functionality." In search of a better solution, Torre contacted a reselling partner of Exact Macola enterprise resource planning (ERP) software. After about 8 months of consideration, Caroline Cole purchased Exact Macola Progression ERP.

"Macola was cutting-edge; it was the way to go for small to mid-sized manufacturers like us," says Torre.

The Birth of Sniperdyne and Nomad eCommerce

Because the ERP improved Caroline Cole's forecasting, inventory, and accounting capabilities, Torre sought a better way to communicate this data to the sales team. He created a web tool using Classic ASP that allowed the sales people to view select ERP data, including material inventory, by logging into a website. This enabled them to inform customers on order fulfillment directly. Internally, the site simplified data access, which previously required navigating three different screens in Exact Macola Progression.

The tool soon evolved to let customers view stock data on the website themselves.

“With this site, our time was freed up for shipping products and ordering materials instead of handling calls about inventory from the sales team and customers,” Torre noted.

Seeing the website's success, Torre expanded its capabilities, allowing customers to place orders and access their account information, such as order history, tracking numbers, and invoices.

“We realized a successful eCommerce website needs to provide valuable information to encourage repeat visits. Like banking websites, which I now visit almost daily to check account details instead of calling the bank,” Torre explained.

Though Torre never planned to start a company, the website attracted other B2B companies needing similar solutions. For three years, he sold the tool, Asimilate, by word-of-mouth. However, the detailed nature of ERP data and the unique needs to B2B manufacturers and distributors meant each project required different levels of customization, making the delivery model unsustainable.

Recognizing this, the software was rebuilt on a .Net framework in 2011. By 2014, 14 years after the initial idea for a web tool, Nomad eCommerce was born.

Nomad eCommerce featured a database independent from, but synchronized with, an ERP’s database, allowing easier updates and configurations through a connection called a DataPort.

Unlike Asimilate, which only synced with Exact Macola ERP, Nomad eCommerce syncs with virtually any ERP.

Explore our ERP Integrations

Revolutionizing B2B eCommerce

After 14 years of developing what he thought would be a simple solution, Torre hopes his story will help other small to medium B2B companies avoid the pitfalls of connecting ERP data with a traditional B2C eCommerce site.

“At Nomad, we get inquiries from businesses who have built or are building an eCommerce website and want to integrate it with their ERP. They assume it’s simple, as I once did, to get data in and out of the ERP through the site. It’s not. It’s nearly impossible without starting over or going massively over budget with customizations and third-party API and products. Because of the uniqueness of every business, it causes a lot of stress, sleepless nights, and (quite honestly) panic attacks.

Now, thanks to Torre's determination and 14 years of hard work, B2B manufacturers, distributors, and wholesalers can benefit from a eCommerce site built for them — one that provides valuable customer data while reducing administrative time—at a fraction of the cost of traditional B2C eCommerce platforms (and their corresponding implementation projects).