Manufacturer cuts digital marketing costs by 15% over 5 years with Sitecore

In a small Belgian town near Antwerp, there is a global transformation in textile manufacturing and marketing. Bru Textiles has set the industry alight with its innovative digital approach to producing fabrics for upholstery, curtains, and draperies. Alongside its highly stylized websites and social media channels, the company even has a line of digitized fabrics which B2B customers use to show end-customers virtual images of products and interiors.

As a business operating globally, digital channels are critical to connecting and communicating with customers and partners around the world. Bru maintains 12 branded websites that showcase its extensive collections and designs. To reduce costs, retain control and exercise consistency Bru wanted to bring all digital activity in-house. But with a small team and a large and complex digital footprint that was challenging.

A longstanding Sitecore customer, Bru’s first step to its in-house digital marketing strategy was to shift its Sitecore platform to the cloud by upgrading to Sitecore XM Cloud. This helped reduce technical complexity and the need for on-premises IT infrastructure and associated resources, as well as cost savings of 15% over five years. The next step saw Bru engage Sitecore360, a success plan that gives customers access to Sitecore experts and resources to maximize the value of their Sitecore investment.

Leveraging the Sitecore360 workshops about moving to a cloud-based solution along with face-face meetings and guidance from Sitecore experts helped Bru reduce its learning time by 30%. Bru was then able to deploy some of the key benefits of Sitecore XM Cloud, including next-generation visual authoring, dynamic personalization, and advanced analytics. Bru also used other elements of Sitecore360, including training, certification, and targeted access to the Sitecore user community.

"Bru Textiles has a small in-house team running a complex multi-site setup. By upgrading to Sitecore XM Cloud and making use of Sitecore360 we have modernized our setup, accelerated website launch timelines and enhanced the overall user experience for our content editors,” said Romeo Cadaoas, Senior Software Engineer at Bru Textiles.

Sitecore360 made the transition to the cloud, using Sitecore XM Cloud, fast and simple. The solution has given Bru’s digital team the knowledge and tools they need to self-serve, manage, and customize the Sitecore platform. By implementing a headless content management system, Bru’s in-house team has transformed its capacity to build and deploy sites more efficiently.

One example of the improvement is how Sitecore360 helped Bru launch its Acacia Fabrics site in just three weeks. The site targets Asian markets, utilizes advanced web technologies like Next.js and supports content in languages such as Vietnamese and Thai. It enables a small, in-house marketing team to bring digital assets and content across a complex array of digital channels to market faster.

Sitecore360 has improved the team’s digital marketing skills and avoided the need for costly external consultants. Bru estimates that its upgrade to Sitecore XM Cloud and use of Sitecore360 has saved around 20% of costs typically associated with the transition to the cloud and other web development projects.