OMAHA, NEB – Financial Transmission Network Inc. (FTNI), a provider of industry-leading integrated receivables solutions, today announced Lipari Foods, a regional full-line distributor serving customers in 14 states, has successfully launched its ETran Integrated Receivables platform to deliver the distributor with consolidated, highly-configurable, payment processing solutions spanning multiple payment methods and channels—all on a single, cloud-based platform. Lipari will take these new receivables processing solutions to market under the “Lipari Direct Payments” moniker.
Headquartered in Warren, Michigan, Lipari Foods was originally founded in 1963 by Jim Lipari and has grown to be a leading distributor of a full-line of deli, bakery, packaging, and grocery products and services. From a central distribution center in Warren, Michigan, Lipari Food’s truck fleet delivers to over 13,000 customer locations in 14 states, six days per week. A member of UniPro Foodservice, Lipari Foods provides its customers with access to over 25,000 products spanning the deli, bakery, dairy, specialty retail, meat & seafood, packaging, confections, international specialty, organic, and health, wellness & beauty categories.
The adoption of FTNI’s ETran platform within the foodservice, beverage and janitorial & sanitation distribution sectors continues to grow, adding an average of more than one new distribution customer per month for the past three years. FTNI’s distribution clients serve customers in every state in the continental United States and a growing number of regions in Canada. Used by leading companies across numerous industries, ETran has proven to decrease processing times by as much as 80 percent and reduce DSO by more than four days.
Lipari’s implementation will include nearly every module of the ETran integrated receivables platform, spanning advanced Remote Deposit Capture (RDC), AutoPay (automatic debit), onlineand mobile payment solutions. Working closely with FTNI and its existing banking institution and enterprise back-office systems provider, Lipari was able to achieve initial production rollout of the ETran platform in less than sixty days.
“As our business continues to grow, the strategic importance of maximizing technological, as well as operational efficiencies across our company is absolutely imperative,” said Michael C. Hegarty, vice president of technology at Lipari Foods. “FTNI’s ETran platform is helping us to eliminate legacy payment processing silos and systems, open new channels from which we can accept payments from our customers, and ultimately enabling us to get payments deposited and posted in our back-office systems faster than ever before. We were able to achieve initial production rollout in roughly 45 days and look forward to launching additional modules on the platform in the coming weeks.”
Through close collaboration and tight integrations with Lipari’s invoicing and back-office systems, the distributor is able to benefit from ETran’s unique ability to deliver true straight-through processing to drive significant efficiency improvements and cash flow acceleration within its A/R operations. As a result, Lipari will benefit from drastically reduced—and in some cases, completely eliminated—manual, time-consuming and error-prone posting and cash application efforts associated with its legacy processes and systems.
ETran’s cloud-based, highly configurable design allows enterprises to quickly tailor the platform to their unique business processes and workflows to consolidate, automate and significantly streamline accounts receivables operations spanning any payment method (check, ACH, credit/debit card, cash), from any payment channel (mailed-in, lockbox, called-in, in-person, online, mobile), all from a single, easy-to-use interface. ETran’s ‘plug-n-play’ nature works with existing banking and merchant processor relationships and supports efficient integration (batch or real-time) with any back-office system. All payment information is processed and stored on ETran’s fully compliant – PCI, HIPAA, SSAE 16 and more – Software as a Service (SaaS) platform.
“Lipari Foods is a recognized leader within the distribution industry and has a strong commitment to leveraging innovative technologies across their business,” commented Zac Robinson, vice president of sales & marketing at FTNI. “Lipari represents yet another leading distributor leveraging numerous modules on the ETran platform to transform A/R operations. We look forward to our continued collaboration with Michael and the team at Lipari as they expand their rollout of the ETran platform and help drive several exciting product enhancements in the coming months.”
About Lipari Foods
Jim Lipari, who began his career delivering BBQ sauce from the back of his Buick station wagon, founded Lipari Foods in 1963. Today Lipari Foods is a leading independent “perimeter-of-the-store” distributor in the Midwest and beyond, delivering a wide range of high-quality deli, bakery, dairy, specialty retail, seafood, packaging, confections, and organic food and beverage products to over 13,000 retail locations across 14 states. Over the years, Lipari Foods has also made substantial investments in its manufacturing and importing capabilities, which both support the distribution operation. Since that first employee in 1963, Lipari Foods has grown to 1,500 associates while its product offering of one BBQ sauce has grown to more than 25,000 items. Learn more at liparifoods.com.
About FTNI
Financial Transmission Network, Inc. (FTNI) accelerates the way businesses accept, process, post and manage payments. Processing millions of transactions monthly, FTNI’s integrated receivables platform, ETran, accepts any payment method, via any payment channel—on a single, secure, cloud-based platform. ETran’s easy-to-deploy, modular design seamlessly integrates current business processes, bank and processor relationships, and back-office accounting software to deliver increased efficiencies and cost savings as a result of true straight-through processing. Founded in 2007, FTNI serves more than 20,000 corporate users from over 1,000 leading companies spanning numerous industries including Banking and Financial Services, Distribution, Insurance, Nonprofit, Property Management, Utilities, and more. For more information, visit ftni.com.
