Black Bear Picture's Success with Sage Intacct & itas

Tell us about Black Bear International

So, my role at Black Bear is, I'm the senior finance manager. And so, I was brought on when the company was fairly new. So, we just started in, I believe, August 2022 and so my role to be brought onto the team was basically to set up an accounting system, because there really was none when I started. So, everything from all of our transactions, were all being recorded basically in Excel, and there was no reporting being done. And so, we were looking for a system that could basically help us do any sort of reporting, and my role was to assist with the implementation of that. BlackBerry International is a UK distribution and international sales agency where we do basically film production, financing, distribution and a little bit of everything in the film production, distribution world. Well, Intacct.

What made you look at Sage Intacct?

I've had a little bit of experience in the past with Intacct and Sage, and so I knew that it could not only give us the multi entity function that we were looking for, because we do have two entities under black bear International, but also allow multiple users to run kind of all of the reports they were looking for. So specific to black bear International is, we obviously have a number of titles with the industry that we're in, and so some people want to report on their on the P and LS for across different titles. Some people want the, you know, consolidated DNL. Some people want to see what the cash balance is. And so, we knew that for the number of different users that wanted to see different reports, that Intacct would be able to do that for us and across the different entities.

What features of Sage Intacct made Black Bear excited?

So we went into Intacct, wanting to basically have one source of reporting. We wanted to avoid having to download reports from Intacct and then have to do a lot of manual work outside of the system. And so, we wanted to build our reports, like I said previously, to basically, yeah, run all the reports in all the different views that we wanted to and so, for example, we wanted to run it on an accrual basis, but we also wanted to see it on a cash basis. We wanted to basically fulfil all of our reporting needs, or most of our reporting needs in Intacct without having our employees have to do multiple work or multiple different works outside of the system and having to edit it in Excel and kind of manipulate the data to kind of do other things. And so, we wanted to just make it as efficient as possible.

Why did you choose Sage Intacct?

The reason we decided to go with Intacct was the consolidation piece. First of all, was one of the big things, because we do have multiple entities that roll up into black bear International, and so that was one of the pieces. And then another piece for us deciding to go with Intacct was We do also have a number of different teams that need to submit purchase orders and all of that, and we could see that it was easy for them to kind of use the system. It was simple for what they needed, and then that would also give us the data that we needed to do our reporting and to also do all of our payables and our cash and kind of everything that the finance team needed as well.

What were you looking for in a Sage Intacct Partner?

Well, when we decided that to go with Intacct and we were looking for an implementation partner, we were looking for someone who really understood our business, because we're not just a typical, you know, manufacturing or anything that has inventory. We do have, like I mentioned, multiple kind of parts. We have distribution, we have production, and a bunch of different parts that are kind of very unique, that are not necessarily in kind of an off the shelf system. And so, we knew it needed to be customised quite a bit for us. And so, we were looking for someone who really understood our system and our needs and would be able to help us make Intacct or use Intacct in the best way possible for how we needed it to operate.

Why did you choose itas as your Sage Intacct Partner?

So we decided to go with itas, because when we were looking for a partner, we felt that they not only took the time to understand our business, and they knew the needs of everyone on the team or everyone that would be using the system, but they also were very transparent in kind of what they could do, what they couldn't do, and prior to having us, you know, sign anything or make any agreements, they held meetings with us to walk them through our processes. In our business, so that they really understood everything that would need to be done and give us realistic timelines as well. And another thing was, because we were so new and we didn't have a current system going, we were looking for something that we could implement rather quickly, but also do it correctly, and we felt that itas would be able to do achieve both of those in terms of, yeah, understanding our business and implementing it how we wanted it, but also doing it in our rather quick timeline.

What timescales did you have for implementing Sage Intacct?

So, we, I believe, we started having meetings with itas in mid-September, and we wanted to hopefully implement it, or go live prior to having a hard December close, so prior to the new year. And we were able to do that by, like early December, we were able to go live. And so, we were actually able to do a November close. And then now it being, well, now it's February, but in January, we were able to do our full year end hard close. So, we kind of used November as our test close and kind of getting all that data in. And then when December came, we just did. We had all the December data, and we were working on December as basically it was happening. And then we were able to do our hard close for 2022 which was great, and it really helped us achieve our reporting deadlines.

What concerns did you have going into the implementation?

Being such a new company, I think the biggest concern for us was that a there was no system, so we really didn't have anything to kind of base it off of and say, Okay, this worked for us in the past, and this worked for us, or this didn't work for us, and so we were kind of just going off of what we knew, and me being kind of the main point of contact, and being new to the business it was I was a little bit concerned of would be able to be able to capture everything and make sure that everyone's needs were met, and that the system would be useful for everyone. So itas was really able to help us, like I said, in the pre implementation meetings, to make sure that they understood everyone's requirements and every kind of aspect of our business, to make sure that we could achieve that as much as possible.

How has your experience been implementing Sage Intacct with itas?

The implementation process was really smooth. It started with, you know, us having a lot of meetings and understanding the business and itas, assisting with the configuration and making sure that it worked. And then in the once kind of everything was set up, they gave us all of the testing scripts and everything so we could go in and do our testing and being able to kind of log tickets and track everything in their system was really helpful, because then everyone would kind of was kind of on the same page of each issue that kind of we came across, and itas was really responsive in responding, and Martin particularly was really on track With, kind of the bigger issues and the more urgent things that we wanted to address, versus the ones that were kind of not as important or, you know, things that could kind of wait later down the line, that weren't as a huge priority or as big of an issue for us. And so, the implementation process was really smooth in that we were able to kind of track everything, and itas is really responsive and helpful for any questions that and issues that we raised.

Have any features surprised you in Sage Intacct?

In terms of functionality, I was surprised that there was actually more reporting than I thought was possible, and being able to customise the reports how we wanted it. And not only that, but we were able to actually have reports for our tax purposes. So, for our US company, for example, we have to file 1090 nines. And I wasn't aware that we could actually mark transactions as 1099 and so it was really easy come year end to be able to kind of pull that data from Intacct and run those reports and be able to file our 1090 nines really, really quickly, which is great.

How has shifting from spreadsheets to Sage Intacct impacted Black Bear?

The biggest impact is definitely that we are a lot more confident in our data, because we know that it's you know, in the system, and we have all the backup and support attached to it, and we can trace everything from, you know, purchasing to or purchase requisition to purchase order, to the invoice, to the cash payment and all of that. And so that's definitely been helpful. And then also, I think the biggest impact is that everyone can kind of see the data, so rather than having one person track the spreadsheet, there's, you know, more segregation of duties here as well. And also, that it's a lot more efficient is, I think, the biggest thing, it definitely has helped with our productivity and efficiency, and just being able to trace back any kind of certain transactions, we are able to see kind of the full flow of it directly in Intacct

How much time have you saved by switching to Sage Intacct?

Definitely multiple, like, hours a week. Rather than having that, having to kind of just make sure that everything like on the spreadsheet is, you know, accurate, in Intacct, it's kind of okay. I know it's missing, and just being able to do bank recs as well in Intacct and make sure that everything was cap is captured, that definitely has saved us multiple hours a week or days.

Why is Sage Intacct a good fit for the entertainment industry?

I think Intacct is really good for the entertainment industry, especially in the film business. Is the biggest thing for us anyway, is being able to report on multiple titles and multiple different aspects of our business, because we do have so many moving parts. So reporting on titles, it was kind of the biggest thing for us, and having that historical data, because films can, you know, take multiple years to kind of produce or get made, or before you need to, from when you start reporting on it or start incurring costs to when you stop, or when you know you actually need the end report for it. And so, for us, having the historical data, I think, was the biggest thing, and I think that's going to be really useful in the future for us. Just, you know, in five years from now, if we still need data for a certain title, we're going to have that backup and Intacct.

What is the biggest difference you have noticed since moving to Sage Intacct?

I think the biggest success has definitely just been able to report separately and kind of see where our how much, like you know, revenue we have from certain customers. And not only that but being able to allocate our costs across certain titles. There are a lot of instances where we incur costs, but we don't need to allocate that until or it's not specific to a certain title, and then we do need to allocate that at a later date. So definitely, being able to kind of see the spread and all of that has been probably one of the biggest successes. I don't know if it's a success for the business, but definitely for efficiency purposes on our end. So for our 2022 close, we had to report our drafts to our advisors by I believe it was February 9, and kind of the efficiency to get from where we were, which was basically we didn't have reporting, and so it was kind of just, you know, having these spreadsheets that we hoped were correct, and so now being able to have certain checklists, and knowing that we're able to actually check these off and know that They're complete. So, our timeline to report to our advisors and give them our drafts and present to the board as well. We're able to close that in, you know, to two weeks’ time, rather than maybe a month, which is what we were doing before.

How has Sage Intacct been received by the wider organisation?

Prior to Intacct for purchase orders. For example, the marketing team would email us, and I would give them a number that I kind of just made up and was tracking separately on a spreadsheet. And so now they're also able to see when they submit purchase requisitions. They're able to see the full flow and know, you know, the pricing and all of that. And they're able to see the invoices and kind of tie everything together and then track it against their budgets, so that they've definitely found it very useful as well, rather than before, where we were basically doing everything outside of Intacct, obviously, and just tracking everything on a spreadsheet and no one really knew how much we were spending or how much was Kind of going in or out of the business. You Yeah,

What would you say to someone who isn't sure about making the leap to Sage Intacct?

I'd say, if you're looking at Intacct, to definitely consider what the uses are, and definitely prior to implementation, consider all of the reporting that you would need to do and the different kind of views or different kind of reports that you would need to run, because Sage Intacct definitely has the capabilities to do a lot more than I thought it could, and we're able to customise to, like I said, all of our different users and their needs and how they want to see it. I would definitely say, take a look at all of the kind of dis different aspects that Intacct can offer, so everything from, you know, purchasing to order entry and all of that, and ensure that you utilise all of that and make sure that kind of the team or everyone in the business it kind of is bought into it.

If someone asked you for a Sage Partner recommendation, what would you say?

I would say definitely, if you're looking at itas as a partner, I would highly recommend them. They were definitely very helpful and very transparent and super on top of all of our needs, and very responsive when we had questions, even after the go live date, if there was anything that we weren't sure how to do or ran across ran into issues with there, they were super responsive and helpful and always kind of willing to take a look at. What the issue is whether it be a user issue or if there's something that needed to be configured. Itas has always been really helpful in responding to our needs and issues very, very quickly, which has been great.

What are your ambitions for Sage Intacct moving forward?

Next on our Intacct journey is we're continuing to build our reports and utilise it as much as we can. So still, even today, we're I'm kind of finding certain features that I didn't know existed, and so kind of being able to utilise Intacct to its full capabilities is our big goals for the future.

Would Black Bear recommend Sage Intacct & itas?

Yeah, just to stress again, that itas specifically has been super helpful. You know, I've gone through other system implementations before, and they have been either very difficult or just not super transparent or clear in what needed to be done, either what we needed to provide or what the team needed to do the implementation. And so, I feel like with Intacct and then with itas kind of knowing exactly what they needed to do and what they what information they needed from us, and having clear deadlines was very helpful for myself and our whole team, so that everyone was on the same page and we were realistic with Our timelines as well.