Inception Group Digitalises and Innovates with Percipient
Hospitality scale-up supercharges business strategy and optimises customer experience with Sage Intacct and Percipient.
About Inception Group
Founded in 2009 by Charlie Gilkes and Duncan Stirling, Inception Group operates a group of high-end bar, restaurant, and club concepts in London, including Bunga Bunga, Mr Fogg’s, Control Room B, and Cahoots. Recognised for its hard work in delivering the most innovative, creative and fun nightlife concepts to London, its vision is to bring people together to entertain them with unique and memorable experiences.
Start-Up to Scale Up
Before the implementation of Sage Intacct, Inception Group was grappling with their previous Sage 50 solution. The system, once efficient, had become a time-consuming and disjointed tool. Manual creation of analysis and intelligence was the norm, and the system’s limitations were hindering potential cost savings and performance improvements.
From a competitive shortlist that included SAP Business One and Xero, Inception Group chose to partner with Sage Intacct and Percipient in 2023. This decision marked a significant step in their digital transformation journey, as they sought to modernise their operations and gain greater intelligence in their business management.
Month-end has shrunk by half, from three weeks to 10 days, which has boosted morale and given the team space to focus on other areas. It also makes accounting much more enjoyable, and because there is so much more scope for other initiatives, career development is much more interesting, with an increasing number of aspects to explore.
“We were incredibly impressed by Sage Intacct’s ability to highlight all key business insights within a simple dashboard in just one click,” comments Govind Raghwani, Group Financial Controller, Inception Group.
“Since using the platform, we benefit from quick, slick reporting and access to the information we need in a matter of minutes. Depending on the query, we simply apply a date range and can see the insights we need at a company level or by site. Reports can be produced instantly. This is music to our Management Accountants’ ears, as they can easily check figures and formulas and produce reports accordingly.
“Month-end has shrunk by half, from three weeks to 10 days, which has boosted morale and given the team space to focus on other areas. It also makes accounting much more enjoyable, and because there is so much more scope for other initiatives, career development is much more interesting, with an increasing number of aspects to explore.
“The time this frees up can be used on other projects, from driving out costs to enhancing the customer experience across our unique venues. Not only does this ability boost confidence, but it expedites our cashflow,” Govind continues.
AP is a key area that is now much more automated for Inception Group thanks to Sage Intacct, which bridges the gap between invoice processing and manual re-keying of different formats and supplier payments.
Percipient has, throughout the deployment and beyond, been so helpful. Because most of the team have accounting backgrounds, they understand the challenges we face, and how the functionality within Sage Intacct will help address and enhance such areas without a need to educate from scratch.
Extending the Brand, Expanding the Venues
“Having grown from just three sites when we launched 15 years ago to 14 currently, with one set to open imminently, we are really seeing the value of a modern cloud-based platform. We simply add a new site to Sage Intacct, and because everything is set up, it’s as simple as clicking a few buttons. Because we have comparable data available on dashboards, we can compare and spot discrepancies easily by looking at the live financial data from across our venues, stemming any potential problems and ensuring overspend is contained. It also allows us to use benchmarks to assist in insights analysis.
“Percipient has, throughout the deployment and beyond, been so helpful. Because most of the team have accounting backgrounds, they understand the challenges we face, and how the functionality within Sage Intacct will help address and enhance such areas without a need to educate from scratch.
“Right from the initial stages, Percipient took time to understand our needs, leveraging their wealth of experience in the industry to help us ensure the very best performance from Sage Intacct. The training was successful and supported the whole team. But more importantly, we felt that we had an open, honest, and ongoing dialogue with them so that in the event of any queries or issues, it wouldn’t be a big deal to call them or e-mail them. They really made the transition process simple and are incredibly supportive.”
Future Plans
“As a business, we never rest and always look at the next initiative. Our next step in leveraging the system is to allow venue managers access to the reporting for greater autonomy, empowerment and agility. We’re also looking to integrate core financials with EPOS and payroll systems to drive even greater intelligence and reporting using a comprehensive view of the entire business, from sales to resourcing.
“With ambitious expansion plans and a need to reassure investors that we’re delivering both value and profits, Sage Intacct is a core enabler of channelling investment in an optimum way and achieving growth most efficiently, and it’s reassuring to know that we have the very best digital platform at our helm. Sage Intacct gives live intelligence from which to optimise performance and deliver the best service. Percipient is always at hand to ensure we maximise its value, refine as it becomes an increasingly important part of our culture, and expedite our performance as we move forward.”
Sage Intacct for Bars & Restaurants
If you’d like to learn more about Sage Intacct, our work with the Inception Group, or to discuss how we can help your hospitality business, get in touch or call us on 01606 871332.
