The Challenge
Shamrock Building Materials is a diversified trading company supplying premium building materials from the Pacific Northwest and global markets. Four divisions. A growing network of remote traders. Reload facilities spread across the country.
Their growth was outpacing their systems. Three problems were compounding each other.
No real-time inventory visibility. Inventory across multiple locations had no centralized tracking. The risk of overselling was real. Resolving discrepancies required manual effort and caused delays at every level of the operation.
Systems that could not scale. Excel and paper-based processes worked at a certain size. As Shamrock added product lines, traders, and locations, those same processes became the bottleneck.
Accountability gaps with third-party facilities. Reconciling inventory positions with reload facilities was time-consuming and a recurring source of disputes. There was no reliable way to verify positions without a full manual reconciliation.
The Solution
RDB Solutions implemented Lumber Expert and Trader Expert, a unified operating system built specifically for lumber trading and inventory management.
The platform gave Shamrock:
- Centralized, real-time inventory tracking across every location
- Trader-level visibility and accountability across the full network
- Daily and hourly financial reconciliation
- Flexible reporting by location, trader, or product line
- The ability to onboard new product lines, including steel, without rebuilding processes
The Results
The numbers tell the story. Staff grew as the business grew, but not proportionally. The platform absorbed operational complexity so headcount did not have to keep pace.
| Metric | Before RDB | After RDB |
|---|---|---|
| Annual Revenue | $25 to 30 million | $280 million |
| Reload Facilities | 2 to 3 locations | Approx. 50 nationwide |
| Inventory Tracking | Disconnected, manual | Tagged to individual pieces |
| Financial Close | Delayed, manual reconciliation | Monthly statements by the 10th |
| New Product Lines | Limited by system constraints | Expanded to include steel |
In Their Own Words
"I honestly believe there's no system that is as customizable to your business as RDB's systems are. Each time we expand, RDB Solutions is 100% there growing alongside us. That's true partnership."
Mike Gambee, President, Shamrock Building Materials
Related Solutions
The Shamrock implementation was built on two core RDB platforms.
