Call2Recycle Automates Battery Recycling Across North America
Case Study
Key Highlights
- 200 man hours saved automating invoicing processing
- $25,000 USD saved annually in fees, licensing, and support
- 1 full-time employee head count saved by eliminating manual tasks
- 8.1 million pounds of consumer batteries recycled last year
Client Overview
Client: Call2Recycle Industry: Recycling, Sustainability
Call2Recycle, North America's largest battery recycler, operates as a successful multi-million-dollar nonprofit organization, collecting more than 200 different end-of-life batteries and battery-powered products from both home and industry usage. This helps divert potentially hazardous materials from landfills while also facilitating the recovery of valuable materials such as cobalt, nickel, and iron, which can be used to manufacture new products like dishware and new batteries.
Founded in the 1990s as a volunteer, industry-run initiative to keep heavy metals from batteries out of the solid waste stream, Call2Recycle has grown exponentially since its inception. Today, there's a good chance that if you've ever recycled a battery, Call2Recycle was involved. While batteries are an eco-friendly alternative to fossil fuels, increasing battery use also increases the need for safe disposal options to protect both the environment and human safety. In 2021 alone, Call2Recycle collected over 8.1 million pounds of consumer batteries for recycling. As the battery production market grows, Call2Recycle will need to continue scaling with it.
The Problem
Despite its dramatic growth, Call2Recycle was still reliant on an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system purchased fifteen years ago. Because of the complexities of the recycling supply chain, the system had been heavily customized to fit its unique processes and many stakeholders. Over time, the aging system and endless customizations led to tens of thousands of dollars in annual fees, licensing, hardware support, and development expenses.
"To manage our work with hundreds of corporate customers and municipalities, at scale, requires a sophisticated self-service system, and that's going to be all the truer the bigger we get." — Leo Raudys, Chief Executive Officer, Call2Recycle
"We've catapulted into an intense period of electrification in all sectors of society, and batteries are at the heart of that. There's an increasing thirst for information about how batteries are managed at end of life, which requires us to get smarter about the overall impacts on the value chain and knowing where individual batteries go. We're seeing a massive expansion in our scope, which we couldn't manage without a modern system." — Leo Raudys, Chief Executive Officer, Call2Recycle
Call2Recycle decided it was finally time for a better technology platform. But as research began, it became clear that no out-of-the-box (OOTB) solution could meet its needs.
"We wanted to take advantage of the latest in technology and move to an integrated, user-friendly platform, but no off-the-shelf solution existed specifically for what we do in the world of reverse logistics." — Rob Latham, E-Bike Program Manager, Call2Recycle
Major Challenges
Unique Stakeholders & Regulations
As North America's largest battery recycler, Call2Recycle works with many municipalities, each with its own recycling regulations dictating where and how recycling can be done. It also works with different businesses, individual consumers, and other stakeholders in each municipality. That creates many distinct operational scenarios that must be managed.
"They may collect batteries from a retailer in one city, then sell them to a different facility in the next city, and the two cities can have drastically different regulations. They needed a system that can account for that, which isn't available out-of-the-box." — Erik Hougaard, EFOQUS Co-Founder, Microsoft MVP & Project Lead
Unique Types of Users
Call2Recycle runs a variety of programs, including its Steward program for battery and product manufacturers and its Collection Partner program for businesses that host collection sites. It engages with individuals and businesses in many different capacities, including:
- Battery producers
- Collection partners
- E-bike program members
- Safety training participants
- Other external stakeholders
The range of portals required for these external users did not exist in available OOTB solutions.
Unique Accounting and Logistics Processes
The most significant challenge came from Call2Recycle's unusual business processes. In a typical accounting model, a product is sold and money is collected by the business: products flow out and money flows in. Most ERP systems are built for these conventional transitions.
Call2Recycle's operations are far more complex. The organization does not perform the recycling itself. Instead, it organizes and connects the parties involved throughout the recycling lifecycle. Combined with its many stakeholders and programs, this creates a wide variety of debit and credit flows that a system must support.
Instead of a simple "money flows in, product flows out" setup, Call2Recycle needs to handle scenarios in which:
- Both recycling product and money flow in
- Both recycling product and money flow out
- Recycling products flow in and money flows out
- Recycling products flow out and money flows in
A single battery may be subject to many inflows and outflows before the process is complete. For example:
- A battery flows into a Call2Recycle collection center (inflow)
- It is transferred to a processor (outflow)
- Credit is received from battery manufacturers for the recycling process (inflow)
- Call2Recycle pays the recycler for the recycling process (outflow)
- The battery is transferred to its final recycling location (outflow)
Although the batteries themselves never enter a Call2Recycle facility, each one moves through the Call2Recycle logistics system at every step. Traditional OOTB ERP solutions were not built to support this level of logistics and accounting complexity.
Call2Recycle also worried about data silos and the difficulty of getting up-to-date analytics. With continued aggressive growth, it needed an ERP system that could evolve with the organization and remain current without costly, time-consuming fixes.
The Solution
"From the initial conversations and feedback from references, EFOQUS stood out from the crowd. The experienced team at EFOQUS leveraged their talent, connections within Microsoft, and network of allies in the partner community to help us achieve our goals." — Leo Raudys, Chief Executive Officer, Call2Recycle
Choosing the Right Partner
Call2Recycle continued its research by attending the Dynamics NAV User Group Summit. There, the team met EFOQUS Co-Founder and Microsoft MVP Erik Hougaard. After discussing its unique organizational needs with Hougaard—who has worked on ERP solutions for the recycling industry since 1991—Call2Recycle chose EFOQUS as its implementation partner.
"We required a technology partner who not only had mastery of the Dynamics NAV product, but also the new cloud platform Microsoft was moving to and their vision for the technology going forward. Erik was an early adopter of the latest cloud technology—plus, he had experience in reverse logistics with previous logistics and supply chain services customers, which helped him understand our processes quickly." — Leo Raudys
EFOQUS emphasizes deep discovery of each client's business needs and requirements.
"All businesses are unique if you really look for what makes them unique. The key is investing the time to find the uniqueness. On the other hand, if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail." — Erik Hougaard
A Custom Solution Based on Dynamics 365 Business Central
EFOQUS used Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central as the ERP foundation for the Call2Recycle solution. Choosing the cloud-based platform over NAV 2017 allowed Call2Recycle to benefit from modern cloud integrations while staying on a steady upgrade path.
Even with roughly 50,000 lines of code written to customize the base Business Central solution, the implementation remained agile while fitting Call2Recycle's specific processes.
Integrated Platform Components
The final solution extended beyond Dynamics 365 Business Central and integrated with:
- Power Apps
- Power BI
- Power Automate
- Dynamics 365 Sales
- Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement
- Hougaard app WSFN
- SharePoint Connector
Though broad in scope, this integrated architecture amplified the solution's usefulness for Call2Recycle.
Power BI
Timely, hassle-free access to data was critical. EFOQUS used Power BI to improve reporting capabilities, giving Call2Recycle immediate access to data and real-time insights that were previously unavailable.
SharePoint Connector
EFOQUS integrated Hougaard's SharePoint Connector to reduce data silos by replicating documentation between Dynamics 365 Business Central and SharePoint in both directions.
WSFN Portals
Because Call2Recycle's processes and programs require many external parties to access and interact with the system, EFOQUS implemented dedicated portals using WSFN. These portals allowed different user groups to log in and work with the system in ways tailored to their roles.
For example, a WSFN portal for the Steward Program allows members to log in and make payments to support Call2Recycle and offset the environmental impact caused by the products each company manufactures.
Power Apps and Power Automate
Power Apps and Power Automate became crucial to Call2Recycle's e-bike battery collection and recycling program, including the provisioning of recycling kits, logistics, safety materials, and rider education.
A typical workflow looks like this:
- A new e-bike recycling partner signs up on the website
- The partner completes an online training module for proper e-bike battery recycling, following national regulations
- A Power Automate flow is triggered
- The system sets up the new partner and creates the first orders for recycling kits and related materials
Dynamics 365 as a Unified System
Call2Recycle's solution turned Microsoft Dynamics 365 into much more than a replacement ERP. The organization now uses Dynamics 365 Sales, Service, and Business Central together in a unified environment.
As a result:
- Customer support can track customer history
- Operations can manage fulfillment and materials collection
- Regional program managers can oversee leads
- Senior leadership can monitor dashboards for organizational health
All of these teams now work from the same integrated data and customer information, eliminating silos and improving day-to-day operations.
Holistic ERP Approach
Call2Recycle's entire recycling facilitation solution uses Dynamics 365 Business Central as its single source of truth, enhanced with carefully designed customizations that still allow continuous upgrades. By treating Business Central as the base platform and extending it through integrations and apps, EFOQUS delivered a future-proof system that works with the processes Call2Recycle already depended on.
Annual Hours, Costs & Hardware Savings
Call2Recycle experiences both daily and cumulative benefits from a well-designed, holistic system centered on Dynamics 365 Business Central.
"We worked with several rock star developers at EFOQUS. The team is outstanding, with supply chain experience, relevant contacts, and other resources that we needed." — Rob Latham, E-Bike Program Manager
Most notably:
- Over 200 hours are saved annually in invoicing processes alone through Business Central automation
- $25,000 USD in annual fees, licenses, and hardware support required by the previous system were eliminated
More importantly, Call2Recycle's operations became more streamlined and efficient, freeing staff to focus less on manual data entry and tracking and more on the organization's mission.
With the new Microsoft Dynamics ERP and CRM system:
- Internal communication and collaboration between departments improved
- Visibility and accessibility of data improved
- Data that was once siloed and controlled by a gatekeeper became available in real time to the broader organization
This means changes in customer needs, new revenue trends, and operational issues can now be identified and addressed quickly. Staff can access information through self-service portals and dashboards—capabilities that will become even more important as the organization grows.
"The reporting capabilities and the data insight are two things that, in my opinion, are more important to the future of Call2Recycle than anything else. That gives them the ability to make the right business decisions, which is quite powerful." — Lars Agger, Managing Partner, EFOQUS
"The partnership has been strategic for our growth into E-Transport, including E-Bike and EV battery recycling. Most importantly, EFOQUS helped us implement in a way that didn't alter the base system structure, so the core Business Central finance and supply chain modules function as standard." — Leo Raudys, Chief Executive Officer, Call2Recycle
Outcome and Future Readiness
The solution EFOQUS built for Call2Recycle not only meets the organization's current needs, but is also designed to grow and evolve with it.
"With our organization now in a growth phase, we find training new staff on our new systems much quicker than before. Audits are less tedious, and many of the transactions that used to take hours of effort to complete are now automated. We have already recommended EFOQUS to several companies. They are an essential partner for us, and we want to recognize them for their role in our success." — Leo Raudys, Chief Executive Officer, Call2Recycle
"In the past, we relied on a gatekeeper to provide metrics, create spreadsheets, and email documents to show how the organization was doing. But by the next day, those data points were already outdated. With real-time information in Dynamics 365, we immediately see trends with our revenue and customers, and we can act quickly if there's any kind of service disruption." — Leo Raudys, Chief Executive Officer, Call2Recycle
About EFOQUS
EFOQUS is a trusted Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central solutions partner. It helps SMBs and enterprise organizations eliminate the hassle of custom ERP extensions while increasing the agility, capability, and scalability of essential systems.
EFOQUS takes the time to understand each client's unique business in order to deliver solutions that enable a "deep exhale" while helping organizations achieve more.
The company helps clients take full advantage of their technology, extend the life of their investment, and increase the value of their Dynamics 365 Business Central ERP systems.
Contact: info@efoqus.ca Website: www.efoqus.ca
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