There are few things softer than a fluffy, all-cotton towel or shirt. But it takes a long journey to get the cotton from the farmer’s fields all the way to a manufacturer’s finished product. An important stop along the way is the ginning process, which involves taking seeds and trash out of the cotton, baling it, and sending it to a mill. The bales then become a commodity regulated by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).

Producers Gin Company based in Theodore, Alabama relies on the Internet to transmit official electronic warehouse receipts to the USDA. Since the company is located in a rural part of the state without access to DSL or cable, Producers Gin initially settled for a dial-up Internet connection to transmit the receipts. But doing business over a phone line with speeds of only about 12 kbps simply didn’t work.

According to office manager Georgi Starr, “On dial-up, it would take us three days to transmit a receipt, and the file transfer would usually end up timing out. So not only did we tie up our phone line, but we risked getting written up and fined by the USDA if we couldn’t transmit properly.”

Then, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, things got worse. “To get work done, I actually had to put everything on a disk and drive to the house of a friend who had DSL,” added Starr. “And we were still issued a warning by the USDA because of late transmissions. That’s when I knew we needed a change.”

Streamlining Business Operations

So Producers Gin decided to upgrade to HughesNet^® Business Internet service by satellite to ensure that its growing business would have consistent, high-quality connectivity and enterprise-grade equipment.

With HughesNet’s high speed and always-on connectivity, Starr can now process an electronic warehouse receipt in three seconds instead of three days. “We’re thrilled at the speed of our HughesNet service. It’s wonderful,” said Starr. “Since demand for our services has gone up, HughesNet has been a big help. We haven’t had any problems with outages or slow connectivity and have actually seen our business operations streamlined because of the satellite service.”

In addition to processing electronic warehouse receipts, the company is using its HughesNet Business Internet service for a myriad of business tasks, including email, file backups, and purchasing.

“Without HughesNet satellite broadband, we simply wouldn’t be in business,” said Starr. But with its reliable HughesNet broadband service, Producers Gin can handle more shipping orders, create and transfer more receipts, and download more software updates than ever before. In fact, the company is processing more than 30,000 bales per year, drawing in freshly picked cotton from farms as far away as 150 miles.

And that means more soft cotton towels and shirts for the rest of us.