BUSIER THAN EVER Thastern (recently acquired by eProductivity Software), producer of MIS software for printers and converters, is easily recognised by its vibrant green branding and forward-thinking marketing and initiatives such as the launch of its ‘Sustainability Show’ TharsternTV series. Regular frequenters of industry trade shows and events may even have spotted one or two ‘Tharbots’ lurking around – a sure-fire way to get people talking about your brand. Founded back in 1984, the company’s inception came about when founder Keith Harrison was working as a financial director within a local printing company. After noticing the pain of working out quotes and re-quotes, he identified a gap in the market in the form of automation of estimating. Roping in the help of his son-in-law who created a prototype of an estimating package on a Commodore PET computer written in BASIC, the feedback from the estimating team was extremely positive. With the prototype being so well received, Harrison decided to extend his vision to the whole industry to enable it to work faster and smarter. To do this, he bought an off-the-shelf company called Tharstern, and deciding to keep the original name, the company was launched from Harrison’s home, subsidised with his accounting consultancy fees. In order to be taken to market, the product needed to run on an IBM PC so Harrison employed a ‘YTS lad’ to re-engineer the software in Microsoft C to operate on the MS DOS platform. The pair worked from the back of a coal shed which they were allowed free use of in return for collecting coal money. Seven years later and the two-man band had grown to a team of six with the company occupying a 1,000sq ft unit on Crownest Industrial Estate in Barnoldswick. A sign on Harrison’s door read ‘Customer is King’ and the founder is said to have pointed at this regularly when emphasising the importance of customer service to his team. This ethos stuck and Tharstern is still known for its customer service today. Changes at the Helm Over the years that followed the company experienced a number of industry firsts from moving to a native 16-bit Windows version of the original DOS-based solution; to later moving to an SQL platform which allowed customers to write their own reports. In 1991 Keith McMurtrie, current managing director of Tharstern also joined as a core member of the team, sharing Harrison’s passion for customer service and bringing the technological vision and ability needed to oversee the growth of Tharstern. 38 From a management buyout to preserving an engaged company culture during a global pandemic, we speak to Keith McMurtrie about MIS supplier Tharstern’s journey over the past four decades email: news@printmonthly.co.uk May / June 2023 - Issue 342 COMPANY SPOTLIGHT / THARSTERN I so often find myself in meetings involving my colleagues and customers, where a customer asks if our software can help with a particularly challenging workflow, and I’m blown away when my colleagues excitedly say, ‘Yes, absolutely! Let me show you!’ ▲ Having an engaged company culture is at the core of Tharstern’s operations
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