Brought to you by BQE ArchiOffice

How does a firm make the jump from two to twelve employees in just a few years during a recession?

How could they possibly triple their revenue between 2005 and 2013? That just doesn’t happen. MattParker, Business Manager at Vertical Arts Architecture admits it’s unusual and that surviving and thriving during a recession wasn’t exactly easy.

They started with just 2 employees and a big dream—to be a premier high-end, multidisciplinary firm, able to provide clients with a full range of services. They wanted to meet and exceed the most discerning clients’ expectations and have Vertical Arts’ vision stamped on every aspect of production.

Since Vertical Arts opened its doors in ’05, they’ve been using ArchiOffice to handle billing and project management. They had fluctuations like everyone else during the roughest years of the recession, yet they’ve more than quadrupled their staff and have plans to expand even more in the coming years.

Their revenue has gone up 300-350% in eight years’ time. Their accountant has even started recommending ArchiOffice to neighboring firms.

They’re able to offer a full service architectural experience—coordinating surveyors, helping clients orchestrate moves or get home inspections done, and allowing consultant billing to come through them.

How Do They Do It?

They Invoice in Half a Day or So

Using ArchiOffice means they can get billing done for all their complex projects in half a day to a day. So all employees’ hours are always billable, and Parker, the company’s only administrative employee can tackle billing efficiently, getting on to his other responsibilities. “If we didn’t have ArchiOffice, we’d have to hire at least one more person, part or full time,” he admits. Instead, they can take on more jobs and projects because their staff isn’t tied up doing administrative work.

They Organize Projects Ridiculously Well

Parker explains: “We have one specific project that we’ve chosen to divide into with 9 sub-projects, so that we can individually track time and expense per sub-project. And ArchiOffice keeps that whole world organized for us. ArchiOffice allows us to manage more jobs and projects with still just one support staff member.”

Their Client Relationships are Rock Solid

“It streamlines our process and gives us access to tons of information and reports quickly so we don’t spend much time answering questions for clients—we just generate it and send it right back. I know our clients trust our billing and our process. It’s really strengthened our client relationships.”

They Became an Incredibly Impressive Firm

“Overall ArchiOffice is just a great billing and project management software—to be able to go to one place and see all your time, all your budgets, all your invoices and transactions, it just streamlines the administrative side significantly,” explains Parker.

Now, Vertical Arts doesn’t have to settle for taking on uninspiring projects. They do most of their work with a number of individual clients. They’ve achieved their dream of being a multidisciplinary high-end firm—they have an interior designer on staff, a landscape architect, as well as a full architectural team, so they’re able to provide the full range of services they know their clients deserve.

Learn more about ArchiOffice Software here.

Check out Vertical Arts Architecture here.