At Great Lakes Computer, we agree with Ben Franklin when he said “If you fail to plan, then you are planning to fail.” A thorough plan is the cornerstone of effective Disaster Recovery. We write about it in our blog all the time. We offer Disaster Recovery backup, replication, and recovery services. We believe in the process for the safety of our own network and data, as well as for our customers. Last month, our own Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP) was put to the test. Here’s our story:
Over a weekend, GLC’s Headquarters in Avon, OH experienced a major flood when a rigid water feed pipe to a toilet in the women’s restroom had been jiggled just enough over the years that its washer finally cracked, allowing three days worth of water to flood the entire facility. The cleaning crew identified the issue and alerted management, who came in to find the carpet and baseboards submerged, with the drywall in every office quickly wicking the water up the walls.
“Luckily, we’re in the business of planning for occurrences just like this, so all we needed to do was begin the implementation of our own DRP, immediately switching from our local servers to the remote cloud-based backups,” said Bob Martin, Great Lakes’ President. They were able to switch over from local to remote servers almost instantly, not missing a beat. That provided them with the time needed to get the local servers back
online in a safe environment.
When asked if Great Lakes customers would have seen an impact, Bob Martin said “No, those systems that monitor the customer equipment and backup their data are already housed in a Data Center and protected. This ‘problem’ primarily dealt with the servers and equipment that run our business and communications. So if we were not successful in implementing our DR plan, communications like phone and e-mail along with our internal systems Accounting, Field Service, and Dispatch would have been affected.”
GLC was able to put their plan into action immediately without data loss, client inconvenience, or lost revenue, underscoring the importance of how essential it is to have a disaster recovery plan in place. Something small – not just a major disaster – can ultimately bring your business to a halt. Martin said, “You don’t have to have the most elaborate or expensive plan, you just have to have a plan, so when things happen you are prepared to deal with it.” The peace of mind you’ll gain will be a huge reward!
There are multiple levels of disaster preparedness available to any business, large or small, ranging from simply keeping a tape backup offsite, to more sophisticated remote backups that can ensure virtually zero downtime. When considering which meets your needs and your budget, you should think about how much money you would lose if your data were lost. A thoroughly written AND TESTED plan is the key to Disaster Recovery. Without it, it’s just disaster. Call us today to ensure your Data is backed up and ready in the event of your own disaster.
Additional Follow Up Note: Not only did we need data Disaster Recovery, but physical recovery as well. We’d like to say thank you to the amazing teams at Dane Contractors and Restorz for helping us get our headquarters restored in an efficient and timely manner.
