...and has provided ongoing support for TWP and IHMS Software for a number of years. Click here for more information and a biography.

 For quite some time there was a company in Houston (actually, Stafford) Texas known as The Phillips Group / Plantation Systems. This company was in the business of brokering retail credit insurance to retailers, generally furniture stores. During the course of their business they acquired software to perform calculations for the stores doing business with them. The software calculated interest and insurance premiums for the loans being made to finance furniture. This software proved to work well as an incentive to gain new clients for their insurance business. Over time, the software was improved and its scope broadened to include a customer database, printing of forms and contracts, management of the installment accounts by accepting payments, adding late charges, and producing various reports. An inventory system was also added along with the ability to tie in cash and layaway sales and even handle revolving charge accounts. This software was known and sold as The Working Partner, or TWP. A later version was also marketed under the name In House Management System, or IHMS. All of this software was for IBM PC compatible computers using the MS-DOS operating system.

I went to work for The Phillips Group in 1988 and, eventually, became the lead programmer in charge of maintaining their software and developing new software. In mid-1992 The Phillips Group went out of business. However, they still had a number of clients using their software all over the country. Another programmer and I secured the rights to the source code for all of The Phillips Group’s software and the client list. Since that time, I have been actively engaged in providing ongoing support services for these clients. I have also been refining the original software and producing extensions to it.

However, the days of DOS software are long gone (though we could have a long discussion as to why they shouldn’t be and the advantages and disadvantages of DOS vs Windows for much business software). In 1997 I produced FRED (Furniture REtail Dealers) software in a Calculations Only version. And, now, there is FRED ‘98. The FRED ‘98 software has all the features and functions needed by the small to medium size furniture store. And, more features are on the drawing board for the next release.

FRED’s history is a legacy of my 10 years of experience in dealing with retail furniture store software needs as relates to installment contract sales and their associated processes. The basis for FRED is TWP. TWP (and IHMS) was initially developed through years of effort by The Phillips Group and all of the software results of that development experience has continued to grow and move forward - to FRED and FRED ‘98. TWP was one of the best DOS based retail furniture software programs ever produced for the small to medium size operation and still rivals anything on the market. FRED and FRED ‘98 take all of the experience, ease of use, and dependability of TWP and IHMS software, add new features and usability, and move everything to the Windows, Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows NT environments.

Only with a long history like this can one really understand the simplicity of use that the small to medium retailer wants. Along with ease of use and intuitive operation, the lesson of history has taught that the software must do enough - without trying to do too much. Too much software produced today tries to do everything under the sun. And, though it may succeed, it has become far too complex with the result that it is more difficult to use and, ultimately, does less for most users!