customer success

Shadowboxer saves days on their payroll with Wrapbook

Overview

Like a worldclass welterweight fighter, Shadowboxer Films is agile, but still packs a punch. Over the last decade, the Glendale, California-based production company has produced over two dozen features—all with a small, nimble team of dedicated, talented creatives.

For Shadowboxer founder Robert Ballo, filmmaking is second nature. Ballo has over 65 feature films under his belt—he’s been producing ever since he was a young man—and his wealth of experience has helped turn Shadowboxer into one of the most exciting—and prolific—production companies in the industry.

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The Problem

Shadowboxer stakes its reputation on consistently delivering quality work on time and under budget. Over the years, that dependability has proven to be a major ingredient in the company’s continued success. However, manual and time-consuming payroll and onboarding processes presented challenges for maintaining this reputation.

Throughout its journey, Shadowboxer managed various payroll and onboarding tools, each presenting its own set of hurdles. Onboarding new employees and contractors was tedious. Producers could waste hours chasing down and filling out paperwork. And compliance was always a question mark.

Adding to the difficulty, whenever a problem did arise, Ballo and his team could find themselves trading emails with a provider, eating up valuable time that could be spent elsewhere. Ballo needed to find a better solution—one that could be, like Shadowboxer, efficient, nimble, and dependable.

“I could do 45 emails over a period of two and a half weeks, or I can pick up the phone and get an answer in five minutes.” — Ballo

Wrapbook’s industry-leading software manages to automate a significant portion of the payroll process, including mundane tasks like overtime calculations and startwork forms. Because Wrapbook streamlines onboarding, payroll, and reporting, Shadowboxer saves valuable time and money, making their business smarter and better organized.

“Wrapbook is organized. Timecards can be done in an easy fashion.” — Ballo

The Solution

For Shadowboxer, the ability to easily access, manage, and track payroll documentation in one place has been a game-changer. But it's not just the platform itself that has impressed Ballo; it's the team behind it.

With Wrapbook, Shadowboxer knows there’s a real person ready to answer all their production payroll and compliance questions. Ballo loves the fact that whenever his company has a question or needs assistance, he can always count on a real person from Wrapbook to respond quickly and work with him to find a solution. The Wrapbook Customer Success team has become an integral part of Shadowboxer’s workflow, helping Ballo and his producers refocus on what they do best: creating world-class films.

“One of the things that I enjoy about Wrapbook is if I have a question, I can shoot our point person an email and a human being actually responds.” — Ballo

Project Dashboard

With Wrapbook’s project dashboard, Shadowboxer no longer spends hours going back and forth with paymasters and crew over things like startwork and timecards. The dashboard puts everything—onboarding, payroll, and reporting—into a single, simple interface. Plus, custom notifications alert Ballo’s team  about any outstanding tasks.

Accounting Integrations

Seamless integrations with Hot Budget and QuickBooks make it easy for Shadowboxer to track payroll expenses against their budget in real time—no more rekeying data. And with Wrapbook’s new custom charts of accounts, companies like Shadowboxer can create as many COAs as they need—all while syncing them with their project accounting seamlessly.

Business Impact

Making the switch to Wrapbook sped up and simplified the way Shadowboxer managed its projects. This simplified workflow isn’t just easier on their team; it also saves them time. Shadowboxer estimates that Wrapbook has saved their company days processing startwork documentation and payroll for each of their many projects.

The Future

Invigorated by recent success, Shadowboxer Films plans on making the next year even more productive, with dozens of projects already filling out their production slate. Thanks to Wrapbook and the time it saves Shadowboxer on onboarding, payroll, and reporting, Ballo and his team are free to pour all of their energy into creating the compelling films their audience has come to know and love.

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