RSL Art Union and base2Services partnership delivers real results for charitable gains
We went to market looking for a partner that would understand us and be a true partner. And that was one of the cornerstone decisions in selecting base2 to work with us on this journey.
Luke Traini, Chief Executive Officer, RSL (Queensland Branch)
See the impressive results
- Since they began working with base2Services, RSL Art Union have reaped multiple benefits across their organisation. Their website remains fast and reliable through peak periods of demand, which means every single customer who visits the site to buy a ticket, gets their ticket with no technical problems.
- Having the technological infrastructure to cope with high demand is so important to a charitable organisation such as RSL Art Union, where every dollar raised - and saved - counts. “As a charity, every dollar that we can save, every dollar we redirect to our charitable purpose is absolutely great. This is certainly one of the benefits we've experienced moving to the cloud," explains Luke.
- He is also impressed with the flexibility of cloud infrastructure in meeting the changing needs of the organisation. “The great thing about being with base2 and having cloud infrastructure is that elasticity of resources that you're able to apply," he says.
- The partnership with base2Services continues to deliver the real benefits to the RSL Art Union that Luke and his team were hoping for. “It's not so much a technology solution - you need to think about how you can apply it in your day to day business to really get that organisational value. The cloud infrastructure is a great technology and we really benefit from it.”
- Luke offers these words to those who are considering making the transition to the cloud: “My advice is to recognise the cloud and embrace it. Embrace it for the value that it can bring back to the business."
A bit about RSL Art Union
The primary objective of the RSL is to take care of current and ex-servicemen and women, their dependents and families – and RSL Art Union is run to raise funds to do just that. Their roots date back to the early 1930's when the Art Union was formed to provide support and care for our returned Australian heroes. The RSL Art Union organise the biggest prize home lotteries in Australia and their prizes range from multi-million dollar properties, to cars and gold bullion. The funds raised from the prize home lotteries provide funding for much needed services to the veteran community, such as crisis accommodation, financial support and rehabilitation. Today it is recognised as the most effective fundraising activity supporting those who defend our great country.
In recent years the RSL Art Union has continued to see rapid growth in ticket sales. This continuing growth prompted them to improve their technology infrastructure to better serve supporters. Luke Traini, CEO of RSL (Queensland Branch) identified the need to address this growth before it became a problem.
What RSL Art Union needed
Luke recognised the current technology infrastructure was not going to cope with the increased growth they were experiencing. Coming from a fixed infrastructure and legacy application background, Luke initiated a transformational technology program to migrate to a new generation of applications.
"When we were looking to take the DevOps journey we knew that it was difficult to build that capability in a business quickly, so we looked for a partner that would enable us to move faster and become more agile." Luke explains.
When the RSL Art Union recently gained TV coverage of the stunning beach house prize, it led to a big rush on people wanting to buy tickets. The tickets are predominately sold through the organisation's website and before they partnered with base2Services, their website was based on fixed infrastructure, which could not cope with the heightened demand. If thousands and thousands of people arrived at the website as it was and tried to make an e-commerce transaction all at once, it was inevitable that the website would slow down, and may even crash.
Luke decided to act and find a partner who could bring their technology to where they wanted it to be.
How base2Services delivered
Since forging the partnership between base2Services and RSL Art Union, Luke and his team have not looked back. base2Services have helped ensure a smooth transition away from fixed infrastructure to the cloud, and this move has enabled RSL Art Union to scale up their resources when needed to successfully respond to customer demand.
base2Services delivered the infrastructure code and RSL's internal team delivered the applications and the code. Together both teams worked closely to ensure alignment and work out the complexities involved with the scaling of Microsoft Dynamics and Sitecore. base2Services now provides ongoing support and infrastructure code enhancements as part of DevOps as a Service.
When we were looking to take the DevOps journey we knew that it was difficult to build that capability in a business quickly, so we looked for a partner that would enable us to move faster and become more agile.
Luke Traini, Chief Executive Officer, RSL (Queensland Branch)