How adoro’s founding controller set up finance to scale

Denise joined the pet insurance startup adoro Pet Insurance Services LLC (adoro) at an earlier stage than she’d ever joined a company before—as the founding controller. The team needed her on board to prepare to launch in all 50 states.

“When I joined, the company only had QuickBooks Online. And for businesses selling into all 50 states, that’s not ideal,” says Denise. “It’s nowhere near sophisticated enough.”

Denise started her search for a new system and built a list. She found that the market tended to only offer general ledgers (GL) they’d quickly outgrow, or big, complex ERPs they couldn’t manage. She wanted a software usable as a team of one (her), but which could scale to support a finance team of 30 with all the role-based controls and automation she’d ever need.

The only option that fit all those criteria was Everest. Now, she is building adoro’s business around it.

“We are preparing for a serious growing year,” says Denise. “The building blocks are all there and finance technology is crucial to us creating a seamless workflow to support the business and ultimately provide a great experience, both internal and external." 

Denise had previously worked at SAP Concur and also knew Oracle’s systems well. She wanted that functionality. But she was dreading those rollouts and the customization required. She wanted the robust system with ease and the ability to quickly lift and modify for a fast-paced, growing company with reporting needs and auditability.

“What I really wanted was something like NetSuite back when it was new,” she says, “before the acquisition. I wanted something on par with the Oracles and SAPs, but usable at our size.” 

I wanted something on par with the Oracles and SAPs, but usable at our size

Denise’s evaluation criteria: 

1. Easy enough to support on her own (team of 1)

2. Feature-set on par with enterprise solutions (eventual team of 30)

3. A partner with an active roadmap, not a vendor

“My advice to anyone evaluating an ERP is you have to know how you’re going to support the tool up front,” she says. “Otherwise, you’ll buy all these features and only use a fraction of what they offer. Yet it’s a tradeoff: You need room. If you can already see where the software is going to be limiting 1-2 years out, that’s also not the right one.” 

Denise connected with peers and industry veterans to ask what they were using. They pointed her to several AI ERPs that are essentially just modernized general ledgers with AI features, and then to Everest. Everest stood completely apart in her mind. 

“I just wasn’t impressed with where any of the ‘AI ERPs’ were headed but I was impressed with Everest,” she says. “The AI ERPs she assessed were hyper-focused on helping small companies and felt there wasn’t growing room at the speed desired.” It also seemed to her like those AI ERPs were overstating the actual live features, and when she asked what other customers were doing with the platform, the sales reps would reply, “We can build that out.” It didn’t feel like they were proven. 

I just wasn’t impressed with where any of the ‘AI ERPs’ were headed but I was impressed with Everest

Whereas Everest stood completely apart. It had the usability and friendliness of the general ledgers but a full ERP feature-set including: 

• Quote-to-cash

• Automated revenue recognition

• Flexible billing with multiple models

• Multi-book and multi-entity

• Could cost management

• Full record to report

• Rich roles, governance, and controls

Everest’s role-based access controls and security showed Denise that this company knew what she’d need as adoro grew. “I would say that Everest was far more robust and sophisticated than the others, but still very easy to use,” says Denise. “For example, in Everest, it’s almost like the cash reconciliations handle themselves. I haven’t done that myself in, oh, I don’t know, 15 years? So it’s really nice to see that I can complete it all myself without much hassle.” 

And to top it all off, Everest was interested in her input and building with her.

“I can tell that Everest is constantly trying to improve the product to add more value for their customers,” says Denise, “Which is very important to me. Their fire was my fire because we’re both trying to hit the ground and go. I recognize and appreciate that they have a startup culture informed by 30 years of enterprise experience.” 

Everest is constantly trying to improve the product to add more value for their customers. Which is very important to me. Their fire was my fire because we’re both trying to hit the ground and go

Denise was also pleased to find that value from sales outreach to support. Talking to Everest employees, she was constantly dealing with experts in revenue—often, CPAs. They could have strategy-level conversations about how to solve her challenges as she built adoro’s entire back office from scratch. They asked questions that stretched her thinking, and vice versa. By the time she’d finished her evaluation and signed, Everest had already built one of the new features they’d been talking about. 

“Compare Everest to everything else out there and they’re obviously so much further along in their journey,” says Denise. “No question, if I didn’t have Everest, I wouldn’t be able to scale as quickly.”