RLB Packaging
Why RLB chose Oracle NetSuite and Project Salsa
A Greentree-to-NetSuite migration story
At A GLANCE
Business
RL Button & Company Ltd (RLB) — established 1920; nationwide packaging distribution plus a growing machinery sales and field service operation.
Previous system:
MYOB Greentree — supported by Verde Group since 2005.
New system:
Oracle NetSuite, delivered by Project Salsa (Verde Group).
Also evaluated:
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central and MYOB Acumatica.
A MOMENT OF CLARITY
For RLB, the decision to move didn't come out of the blue. After around twenty years on MYOB Greentree, the signs were adding up: licence fees rising each year with little new benefit, no AI on the vendor's roadmap, and the knowledge that an on-premises platform would reach end-of-life eventually. Steve Hazard didn't want to be, in his words, “the last cab off the rank.”
The moment it crystallised was a CFO conference on modern ERP and where AI is heading. The message that stuck was simple: to take advantage of AI, you need a clean, modern data set. Two decades of Greentree had left RLB with the opposite — data carried over from an even older system, layered with years of unnecessary customisation and thousands of obsolete inventory codes that couldn't be archived. A move to a modern, cloud-native platform was a chance to start with a clean slate.
“We had to upgrade from an old legacy system to a modern system at some stage. It just seemed the right timing.”
— Steve Hazard, General Manager | Finance & Operations, RLB
WHY PROJECT SALSA
RLB and Verde Group go back a long way. Verde has supported RLB's Greentree environment since 2005 — a two-decade relationship that meant, when the time came to choose a NetSuite partner, RLB wasn't starting a new relationship so much as continuing an established one.
At the heart of that relationship is Craig Anderson. Having worked with RLB for years through their Greentree days, Craig already knew the business inside and out — its contracts, its quirks, the way it really ran. When it came time to scope a NetSuite solution, that history meant RLB could get straight into the detail rather than starting cold.
The difference showed up everywhere. Where explaining something like their contract pricing to a partner who didn't know them might take a couple of hours, with Craig it took five minutes. The scoping documentation was more thorough, the discovery went deeper, and the whole engagement felt more responsive from the very first document.
“It was easy for us to dive into a bit more depth, because Craig knows our business so well. The whole process from the start was a lot better — it's been pretty smooth, really responsive.”
For RLB, that depth of understanding wasn't just a convenience — it was a genuine de-risker for a migration carrying twenty years of history. Verde Group's long Greentree heritage, and two decades of shared history with RLB, meant the team moving them forward already understood exactly where they were coming from.
WEIGHING UP THE OPTIONS
Long relationship notwithstanding, RLB ran a genuine, open comparison before committing. Alongside NetSuite, they evaluated Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central and MYOB Acumatica.
MYOB Acumatica
MYOB Acumatica was ruled out early. For RLB's requirements it lacked the depth of functionality they were looking for, and it didn't offer the AI roadmap they saw as central to future-proofing the business. It didn't progress to a serious head-to-head.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central
Business Central was the closer contest, with the pull of the wider Microsoft ecosystem — Excel, Word and Power BI already familiar to the team — and native contract pricing. But as the evaluation went deeper, a series of gaps emerged that mattered a great deal for RLB's particular business: repeated warnings about integrating their Magento e-commerce site (to the point of being advised to replace it), a field service option that didn't fit as well and carried a materially higher implementation cost, and no strong twelve-month cash flow forecasting. For RLB's mix of requirements, those were decisive.
WHY NETSUITE
As the comparison went on, the decision kept moving one way — and for RLB it always came back to fit. NetSuite lined up with the business RLB is today and the one it's becoming, across the areas that mattered most.
A single, modern, cloud-native platform
After two decades on an on-premises system, RLB wanted a genuinely modern foundation — one platform, in the cloud, accessible from anywhere. That reach brought a practical benefit beyond convenience: if anything ever happened to the building, the business could keep running, making NetSuite a sensible move from a disaster-recovery point of view as well as a day-to-day one.
A clean slate, not a rebuild
Twenty years on Greentree had accumulated a great deal of complexity — customisations built for one-off requests, and thousands of obsolete inventory codes that couldn't be archived and cluttered every search. Moving to NetSuite was a chance to simplify rather than recreate all of that: a clean, well-structured database and streamlined processes, rather than twenty years of workarounds carried forward.
Depth where RLB needed it
On core functionality, NetSuite went deeper. RLB found stronger capability across the core modules, and better inventory management and inventory forecasting than the alternative — important for a distribution business of its scale. Two areas in particular stood out:
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E-commerce integration: RLB's Magento e-commerce site — an investment they've made heavily in and see as central to their future — integrates cleanly with NetSuite, with no need to re-platform.
- Field service: For a fast-growing machinery and servicing operation with technicians on the road, RLB has paired NetSuite with Shepherd, a NetSuite-native field service solution. Together they give the business drag-and-drop scheduling, native mobile apps that put the ERP in each technician's pocket, and field capture of time, parts and materials that flows straight back into NetSuite for job costing and invoicing — fitting the way RLB actually works.
Ready for what's next
Above all, NetSuite matched RLB's ambition to future-proof the business. As a cloud-native platform with a clear AI trajectory, it gives them the clean data foundation to build on — the very thing the CFO conference had flagged as the prerequisite for making the most of AI. For RLB, that forward path was central to the decision.
RLB valued NetSuite’s capped, predictable pricing model — but the deciding factor was fit, not price. Business Central and Acumatica are perfectly capable platforms for many businesses; for RLB's particular mix of e-commerce, field service and inventory, NetSuite was simply the stronger fit.
LESS MANUAL WORK, MORE ROOM TO GROW
RLB expects to feel the change first in field service scheduling and technician job costing, in sales order processing, and in finance and reporting. Today, technicians out at a remote site scribble their hours and parts on paper and job-cost them manually days later back in Auckland; a modern system should take much of that friction away. Elsewhere, the goal is less manual keying — in areas like sales order entry and credit card handling — and a cleaner data environment for better reporting to support the next phase of growth.
RL Button & Company Ltd (RLB) is one of New Zealand's longest-established packaging businesses. Founded in 1920 by general merchant Robert Lorimer Button, the company has spent more than a century helping customers protect, package and present their products safely and efficiently. What began as an importing business now spans an extensive product range and a nationwide distribution network, serving businesses of every size across the country.
Alongside its core packaging distribution, RLB has built a fast-growing machinery sales and servicing arm, supported by a field service team of technicians working on-site with customers throughout New Zealand. A century on from its founding, the business remains guided by the same purpose — to make a positive difference to its customers, its team and its communities.
