Arco migrates to SAP on Azure

Arco offers over 170,000 quality assured, branded and own brand products including workwear, footwear, PPE and workplace safety products. Its Safety Services team offer training, consultancy, rescue and site services to businesses across the UK. Headquartered in Hull, Arco reaches its customers through its extensive product catalogue, interactive website and national network of retail stores. The company has sales of over £295m and employs approximately 1600 people nationwide. 

Due to a multi-million pound development project improving the A63 in Hull, Arco is relocating its present-day HQ in Waverley Street, where the business has been based for almost 60 years. This move has provided Arco with the opportunity to return to Hull’s vibrant Fruit Market waterfront, which was the site of its first store 120 years ago. It has also helped Arco accelerate its digital transformation journey.

Ensono has been chosen to migrate the existing data centre environment onto Azure and to manage the cloud infrastructure. Once completed, the public cloud environment will allow Arco to take full advantage of Azure and its plugins and turbocharge the company’s growth plans.

Richard Martin, Digital Director of Arco, said: “Arco’s migration to Azure, prompted by a change of headquarters, enables us to stay ahead of the industry’s ever-evolving needs and opens us up to new ways of working. We were impressed with Ensono’s all-round capabilities, meticulous planning and attention to detail, which convinced us they were the right partner for us.”

Martin continues: “Our office move is one of the most important events in our long history and is pivotal for our future success. Our goal is to evolve into an end-to-end safety business, offering services ranging from consulting on safety requirements, to the sale and delivery of all necessary safety equipment, and this digital transformation really helps accelerate these growth plans.”

Oliver Presland, VP Global Product Management of Ensono, said: “The new Azure environment puts Arco in a powerful position. This migration offers a significant opportunity to explore how Azure can take their operations and their service to the next level. IoT and artificial intelligence plugins offer the firm the ability to create efficiencies, decrease delivery times, improve order fulfilment, and improve customer service.”

Ensono will fully-manage the environment over the next 12 months and will support future innovation on the new cloud infrastructure.