Internet proving both blessing and bane
By Brian Carroll -- Furniture Today, January 11, 2004
HIGH POINT — The Internet proved again in 2003 that it is both a blessing and a curse. Supply chains became more efficient, e-commerce continued to expand both to consumers and among businesses, and systems improvements meant better connectedness throughout the industry.
But last year may be more remembered for two blights on the new information economy — e-mail spam and computer viruses.
Congress passed legislation to curb spam in late November, and industry experts believe the tide of junk e-mail has crested.
"My mailbox usually contains about 80% spam," said Jeff Baker, chief operating officer at South Florida retail chain Carls. "But it seems to have leveled out over the last six months."
"Without question, spam's total impact on a company's productivity can be substantial," said Stephen Antisdel, president of PreceptPartners, a consulting firm serving the furniture industry. Before starting PreceptPartners late last year, Antisdel was chairman of FurnitureFind.com, a leading furniture retailer on the Web.
Perhaps a quarter of manufacturer Hooker Furniture's e-mail is unwanted, according to Talmage Fish, vice president of information services. Other companies report similar rates of spam, which are still below the national average of between 40% and 50%.
Attacks on the rise
If spam is a prank, e-mail and operating system viruses are vandalism, taking systems and servers down. Microsoft's operating systems and server and desktop applications were particularly vulnerable in 2003, but all computer networks saw a rapid rise in hack attacks last year.
High Point retailer Rose Furniture, for example, reported more than two dozen "attacks" on its system every day, although most are merely pings to detect system vulnerabilities.
"Our response to those attacks was to install a very sophisticated, expensive firewall," said Dwight Ball, who oversees Rose's Internet development. "We also have developed excellent relationships with several IT specialists in the area who keep us informed whenever they hear of security issues that might affect us."
At Hooker, security requires a multi-pronged strategy. Antivirus and firewall protection software filters out most potential attacks, said Fish, and discourages hacking and hostile intervention. The company also runs two server systems so that if one is lost or knocked down, the other can continue to run production systems.
Some predictions
This year, systems security is likely to continue to dominate IT discussions. Integrating systems, upon which e-procurement depends, and supporting an increasingly global supply chain also will remain top priorities.
And furniture companies increasingly will look to the Internet to purchase goods and services.
Hooker uses electronic data interchange, dealer order-entry and sales representative order-entry to reduce errors and costs, participating with a handful of business-to-business networks.
One of those networks, FurnishNet, reports connecting more than 400 furniture manufacturers. The GERS company said it had over $1.8 billion in purchase-order volume under contract at the end of 2003, an increase of 155% over 2002.
In addition, three Top 100 stores are cooperating on a grass-roots B2B e-commerce network. Carls Furniture, Altoona, Pa.-based Wolf's Furniture, and Badcock Home Furnishings unveiled in October a decentralized (or peer-to-peer) e-commerce package to link them with some of their largest manufacturers.
Exim and the National Home Furnishings Assn. also are collaborating to connect NHFA retailers with a growing roster of factories.
Rose's Ball predicted that, in addition to security, issues of scalability and training will get a lot of attention this year. Hooker's Fish added wireless computing and business continuity planning to the list.
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