Carl Hansen & Søn gain higher quality financial data
Instantly adjusted
EXCHANGE RATES EVERY MONTH
Higher quality
OF FINANCIAL DATA
Left: Christian Mølsted, Group Accounting Manager;
Right: Henriette Brøgger Led, Group Financial Controller
The short story of
carl hansen & søn
Carl Hansen & Son is a production company that has years of experience in making iconic design furniture. The company believes that iconic design is a combination of simplicity, aesthetics, and function, brought to life through skilled machining of the best quality materials. Their story began in 1908 when Danish furniture maker Carl Hansen opened a small furniture workshop on Funen.
Carl Hansen & Søn’s development has been strongly influenced by their longstanding relationships with one of the greatest designers ever: Hans J. Wegner. The creative collaboration began in 1949 when Wegner created a famous series of chairs, which include the iconic Y chair. Today, Carl Hansen & Søn furniture is sold globally. The company has 10 subsidiaries spread across the world. The company has 360 employees and an annual revenue of 500 – 600 million DKK.
Moving from excel to konsolidator® solved exchange rate challenges
In January 2019, Carl Hansen & Søn started to use Konsolidator® for their financial consolidation. It solved several issues but there was one particular one problem that was essential to the financial team. When the financial team performed the annual account consolidation for the whole group, they always had to regulate the exchange rates. Prior to using Konsolidator®, every monthly report had to be reviewed, and the exchange rates used every month throughout the entire year had to be adjusted.
“Now, we get the updated exchange rates automatically every month. This means that we do not get a huge shock in December.” – Group Financial Controller Henriette Brøgger Led.
An increase in data quality
According to Christian Mølsted, Group Accounting Manager at Carl Hansen & Søn, the quality of the financial data has increased since the company started working with Konsolidator®. The numbers are much more accurate now because of the automated processes such as the updated exchange rates and the possibility of making changes and post entries right away. These features enable the financial team to go back and review the history of the financial numbers. According to Christian Mølsted, a monthly and a yearly report at Carl Hansen & Søn is now more or less the same process just at a smaller or larger scale. Often there will be a regulation for a monthly report, which is now easier for the financial team to manage. They can also easily get an overview of their financial data across the whole group with Konsolidator®.
“Our level of data-quality has increased. If we should have had a similar level to the quality of our data before Konsolidator®, then we would have used a great amount of time on this. In this way, we save time and gain a better data quality.” – Christian Mølsted
Henriette Brøgger Led agrees to this and mentions that the work with post entries and making the data traceable also has been a huge advantage for the financial team at Carl Hansen & Søn. Before using Konsolidator the team had to make manual regulations and post entries within Excel. This could be a problem since there was no note connected to the manual changes and corrections like there is in Konsolidator.
“There was no text connected to it, which stated why the regulation or post entry was made, so you were not able to see why someone had done this. Then next month you had to delete this post entry, because now suddenly is was applied to the account.” – Henriette Brøgger Led
The noteless method could create some confusion and flaws in the excel sheet. Now with Konsolidator® it is easier to look up the origins of the financial data which makes the financial figures more accurate and trustworthy for the financial team at Carls Hansen & Søn.
A digital system designed for one thing: Financial consolidation
Group Financial Controller Henriette Brøgger Led sitting
in a chair designed by Carl Hansen & Søn
One of the reasons that the financial team at Carl Hansen & Søn chose to work with Konsolidator was the fact that Konsolidator is specifically focused on one thing: managing financial consolidation. It was essential for the financial team that the system was simple and easy to navigate in when doing the consolidation of the group.
“I like the fact that it is a system [that]is an expert of one thing. It makes it easy to navigate in, it is super simple to use, and it works for what we need it for.” – Christians Mølsted
As one of the persons who is working daily with Konsolidator, Henriette Brøgger Led states that this is the case. It makes the work processes run smoother both because the system is automating some of the work processes but also because it is such a simple tool.
“It is a very simple tool to navigate. It is constructed in a simple way, so there are not a lot of buttons for several different functions that you are never going to use anyway. There are only the buttons and functions you need and will use.” – Henriette Brøgger Led.