THE CUTTING EDGE : Case Study: How technology changed a business : At Mazda, Using Computers to Rev Up Customer Service

Three years ago, Mazda Motor of America, fearing the worst, dispatched employees to visit its dealerships posing as customers in search of out-of-stock parts. The “mystery shoppers” confirmed the awful truth.

Dealers often had no idea how long it would take to get a part, or promised delivery by a certain date and then had to renege. Mazda customers generally had to wait days longer for repairs than did owners of Nissans, Toyotas and other makes of vehicles. Customer satisfaction was woefully deficient.

“We were dead last in how long it took to get a part, and near the bottom in the number of dealers that already had the part,” said Michael Anzis, vice president of information systems for Mazda Motor of America, based in Irvine.

Three years and more than $10 million in technological revamping later, customer--and dealer--satisfaction is on the upswing for the U.S. arm of Japan’s Mazda Motor Corp.

By placing orders on personal computers hooked up to an IBM mainframe at headquarters, dealers can now get parts delivered overnight. Instead of scouring old-fashioned microfiche records, parts managers can call up computerized descriptions, diagrams and pictures from an electronic parts catalogue played on a compact disc device. In the works: An interactive system that will coach mechanics through tricky repairs as they work in the service bays.

Lately, Mazda has been battered by resurgent U.S. car makers, a weak yen and the deteriorating Japanese economy. Like other auto makers, Mazda has been forced to lay off workers, but its embracing of computer technology has helped there, too. Mazda executives insist the job cuts aren’t the result of the revamping. They say the new system made it possible for them to cope when the layoffs became necessary.

Mazda reinvented its parts system with technology that is far from the cutting edge. On the contrary, the company’s experience shows how much can be done with established technologies.

Mazda devised its new parts strategy in 1991, with the help of Andersen Consulting, a leading technology adviser based in Chicago. After a three-phase, 18-month rollout, the last of Mazda’s 800 dealers were trained on the new equipment last June.

The goal of the project was deceptively simple: To improve customer satisfaction at the dealership. And management knew early on that computer hardware and software could take the company only part of the way there. Most important was instilling a new customer-comes-first attitude in the dealers, many of whom sell other makes as well as Mazda.

“It was clear that grabbing hold of dealers’ attention . . . was essential,” said Doug Willinger, an Andersen Consulting partner who worked on the project.

Computer technology helped with that, too. At Mazda headquarters, the IBM mainframe, running software developed by Andersen, began working in real time, rather than the previous method that imposed an automatic one-day delay for filling orders.

Next, Mazda used custom-developed software to make the dealerships’ IBM workstations more responsive. The software can search the system for anything from an oil filter to a water pump for a 20-year-old RX-3. If the dealer orders the part by 3 p.m., the computer immediately confirms that the part will arrive the next morning from one of seven U.S. distribution centers.

For harder-to-find parts, dealers can now place a daily “back-order inquiry” that provides estimated times of arrival. In the past, the actual delivery date was always a mystery.

With the CD-ROM electronic parts catalogue, updated monthly, dealers can type in a car’s 17-digit vehicle identification number and be assured of getting the exact part needed.

Just as important as having the right technology in place, however, has been Mazda’s push to communicate with and train its far-flung network of dealers, parts managers, mechanics and employees--all 36,000 of them. The hand-holding, Mazda officials said, never ends.

“It’s going to be a constant sell for dealers to see the wisdom of approaching the customer in a different way,” said Vic Morine, Mazda’s director of parts operations.

The new system has been a boon for dealers trying to keep pace with orders for the 70,000 parts needed for every model, style and production year.

For Mike Rudolph, parts manager for Almaden Mazda in San Jose, the clincher is overnight delivery instead of a wait of two to five days. With Mazda now filling 90% of dealers’ orders in just one day, he can stock up on the hottest-moving parts.

“The parts end (of the business) right now is just booming,” he said. “At times previously, it was kind of depressing.”