NetVanta Key Ingredient to Star Market’s
Formula for Success

Since 1944 Star supermarket has been serving residents of downtown Huntsville. Known for its “superstore” selection, value and old-fashioned customer service, Star’s goal is to provide every customer with a shopping experience that meets their individual expectations through great people, best service, safest products and low prices resulting in the best value for today and tomorrow.

Since its humble beginnings, Star Market has taken flight. Now the chain encompasses three grocery stores, six pharmacies; a home health store and a warehouse. With rapid growth and more expansion plans underway, Star proprietor, Darden Heritage knew he had to have a robust network to support this thriving organization.

Like many smaller businesses, Star does not have an onsite IT department. This led Star Operations Manger Greg Ricksaker to contact Scott Pell, vice president of API Digital for help with this project. API Digital provides day-to-day management of Star’s network and is responsible for development of their Voice over IP (VoIP) phone system. After evaluating the situation, Pell engaged Network Services and Support (NSS) as a partner in the project NSS performed a network assessment. They soon discovered that the network in place at that time was very problematic. ”The majority of their network was a combination of several brands of consumer-grade, off-the-shelf equipment,” said Pell. “User satisfaction with the network was at an all time low. Star, like many small businesses, did not know what they had or what they needed in terms of hardware. They just knew they needed it to work.” Darden Heritage, Star Proprietor. With the new network in place, Star is now able to transmit data from each of the stores to the main host location and to interact with mission-critical applications at the warehouse location. And most importantly, since implementation downtime has become a thing of the past. When asked about the benefits of a business-class network Cechovic replied,

“Small and mid-size businesses are starting to see how important their networks are to their business success. When the network is a key factor, consumer-grade products don’t offer the functionality and reliability these businesses need.”

Pell explained that most of the time small and mid-size businesses are either undersold with a product offering a sub-standard feature set and less than desirable reliability or oversold with a product that is too large and too expensive for their requirements. “NetVanta allows SMBs to be right-sized,” said Pell. At this point no network plan existed. Likewise there was no plan for network expansion. NSS designed a network plan that included a robust network for mission critical applications as well as a formula for rapid deployment at expansion sites.

ADTRAN’s NetVanta products were selected to play a key role in the network. NSS recommended a combination of NetVanta 3448 and 1335 Multiservice Access Routers with Wi-Fi capability, NetVanta 1224 PoE switch-routers and NetVanta 150 wireless access points.

“NetVanta products are a good alternative for small and mid-size businesses,” said Cechovic. “These products offer the functionality and reliability businesses, like Star need at a price point smaller businesses can afford.”

All of the stores located throughout the city are connected back to the main location and the warehouse via VPN connection. The NetVanta 3448 acts as the main VPN concentrator at the host location. The NetVanta 3448 along with two NetVanta 1224R switch-routers are used to terminate all the VPN tunnels coming in from remote locations and the warehouse. Pell explained that most of the time small and mid-size businesses are either under- sold with a product offering a sub-standard feature set and less than desirable reliability or oversold with a product that is too large and too expensive for their requirements. “NetVanta allows SMBs to be right-sized,” said Pell.

At this point no network plan existed. Likewise there was no plan for network expansion. NSS designed a network plan that included a robust network for mission critical applications as well as a formula for rapid deployment at expansion sites.

ADTRAN’s NetVanta products were selected to play a key role in the network. NSS recommended a combination of NetVanta 3448 and 1335 Multiservice Access Routers with Wi-Fi capability, NetVanta 1224 PoE switch-routers and NetVanta 15 wireless access points.

“NetVanta products are a good alternative for small and mid-size businesses,” said Cechovic. “These products offer the functionality and reliability businesses, like Star need at a price point smaller businesses can afford.” All of the stores located throughout the city are connected back to the main location and the warehouse via VPN connection. The NetVanta 3448 acts as the main VPN concentrator at the host location. The NetVanta 3448 along with two NetVanta 1224R switch-routers are used to terminate all the VPN tunnels coming in from remote locations and the warehouse.

In addition to data transmission, voice is another critical part of the Star network. “They would like to take advantage of the benefits of Voice over IP,” said Cechovic. The new network will allow them to do that easily and affordably.” API and NSS have already started Star Market’s transition to VoIP. This will allow them to access a much more reliable phone system with new features and functionality, while saving money in the long run.

Getting Ready for Growth

Star Supermarkets and Pharmacies want to be known as “friendly, neighborhood stores” that are located close to their customers where they can form close relation- ships with their patrons. To do this, Star has expanded its boundaries and is growing to meet its customers where they live. Star recently opened a new pharmacy across town, reaching a new clientele. While opening a new store can take months of preparation, that was not necessary for Star. The network expansion plan NSS put in place for them allowed them to order the equipment and have the location up and running within a couple of days after the equipment arrived.