Bubblelab Laundry Sdn Bhd builds, operates and maintains 24-hour self-service laundry chains throughout Malaysia. The company started with three outlet locations in 2013, and has since expanded to more than 200 facilities. This expansion has resulted in day-to-day operations growing increasingly complex due to increased customer demand and routine maintenance. In 2018, the laundry chain implemented Laserfiche to digitally transform its maintenance management processes, enhancing communication between the company’s employees, boosting productivity and supporting Bubblelab Laundry’s continued growth.

“Within a few weeks of our system going live, Laserfiche helped us achieve continuous improvements in our work environment, performance and productivity — impacting day-to-day business and aligning with our company values,” said Bubblelab Managing Director Kenny Wong.

Since working with solution provider, Ricoh (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, to implement Laserfiche at the core of its digital maintenance management system across all store locations, Bubblelab has undergone a true digital transformation, improving employee productivity, streamlining project management and reducing costs organization-wide. These results included shortening staff response times to 1.5 days, exceeding the organization’s original target by 70% and contributing to cost savings that would enable Bubblelab to reinvest in staff and equipment.

Bubblelab Laundry differentiates itself by providing an exceptional customer experience — prioritizing quality, speed and value. The company’s commitment to service, coupled with its franchising strategy, has led to steady growth throughout the country. The Bubblelab leadership team understood that the ability to scale maintenance processes would be key to expansion while maintaining the customer experience that was signature of the Bubblelab brand.

The organization traditionally relied on manual processes to support machine and store maintenance, which would not be sustainable as Bubblelab grew. In order to automate and optimize these processes, Bubblelab used Laserfiche enterprise content management to develop a digital maintenance management system.

The company selected Laserfiche for the ability to create custom electronic forms with an intuitive interface, recognizing the value in using various electronic forms and automated processes to replace paper and manual tasks. The Bubblelab team also saw potential in having access to Laserfiche’s Business Process Library, a collection of prebuilt processes that provide the downloadable tools necessary for rapid business process automation and deployment. Another important consideration for Bubblelab’s digital maintenance system was that it would be able to automatically route all important information to appropriate departments and employees for approvals, while also maintaining data security — something not possible with the company’s legacy ad-hoc processes and manual tasks.

Within a project timeline of just six weeks, the team was able to implement Laserfiche, train employees on the new system, and identify five workflows to digitize. The organization also identified key performance indicators for each process based on metrics including: entries in the defect logbook, corrective maintenance, preventive maintenance, material requisition and field staff clocking.

Today, Bubblelab outlet locations record all maintenance issues in their defect logbook integrated with dedicated Laserfiche workflows, through which service teams are automatically issued a corrective maintenance ticket containing project location, task information and deadlines. In the event a spare or replacement part is needed, rather than relying on emails and text messages to request materials, service teams can initiate a material requisition workflow through a Laserfiche Form to indicate the items needed, as well as the quantity and collection date. The information is automatically routed to stock managers for preparation, and team leads are then required to submit electronic documentation before and after the repair work to generate a service report, which includes maintenance descriptions, photographs, employee check-in/check-out times and overall project timeline. The service supervisor is able to run reports in Laserfiche that help schedule and distribute service tickets more effectively. As a result, a works schedule briefing that formerly took a half-hour daily has been eliminated.

Additionally, Laserfiche automatically sends employee hours to the human resources department for payroll calculations. The information also helps give managers a view of staff schedules and what service tickets are outstanding.

These digital workflows have helped maximize service team resources, including travel costs and time dedicated to scheduling and communication. Bubblelab’s digital maintenance management system also takes advantage of Laserfiche’s robust document management features including granular access controls and audit trail, enabling the leadership team to maintain information governance while improving efficiency and transparency for service teams.

A Fresh Start for Digital Transformation

Bubblelab realized increased productivity and reports of a more positive work environment within just seven weeks of deploying the new digital maintenance management system. Since the project’s launch, the company’s Laserfiche implementation represents a cost savings of more than US$44,000, a figure projected to grow.

“The ease-of-use and level of detail possible through Laserfiche gave us the confidence that these solutions could handle any of our growing requirements,” said Wong. “We have really enjoyed designing forms and processes while identifying what other departments we could digitally transform. Laserfiche truly exceeded our expectations, improving company-wide project management in ways we did not originally anticipate.”

Bubblelab management is also now able to make more data-driven decisions, which positions the company for further growth. The organization is now seeing response times that are 73.8% faster than the original target of four days, and management now has the tools and information needed to continue optimizing processes. Beyond the initial digital workflows, collected information has also been used to manage inventory through the accounting system, reducing time spent on daily data entry. These extensive benefits have contributed to improved employee morale as a major driving factor for day-to-day operations, allowing greater control over operations to match with long-term expansion goals.

Learn more about how to use ECM and process automation to improve response times, increase employee bandwidth and foster an innovative workplace with The Business Process Automation Buyer’s Guide.