Kandji or Rippling IT for a Building Materials Supplier

A single-location business worries about which devices it has. A multi-branch supplier worries about which branch has which device, and whether the branch manager who set it up two years ago documented anything. Before comparing Kandji and Rippling IT, get an honest count of devices per branch, because the platform decision matters less than whether you have any central visibility into what's out there at all right now.

Some suppliers standardize on iPads for the counter and yard because they hold up reasonably well and are simple for staff to learn. If that's your setup, Kandji's Apple-native controls, enrollment through Apple Business Manager so a replacement iPad ships pre-configured to a branch, and enforced passcodes for a device that sits at an open counter, fit the profile. It won't manage the Windows PC most branches also keep for accounting and ordering, so a fully Apple counter fleet still leaves that machine outside its reach.

For branches running a mix of Windows POS terminals, office PCs and the occasional Mac, Rippling IT's single console across operating systems means a regional manager can see every branch's devices in one place instead of calling each location to ask what's actually installed. Tying provisioning to hiring records also helps with counter staff turnover, which tends to run higher at the branch level than in a home office.

Yard and warehouse handhelds for pulling inventory are typically ruggedized Android devices running their own inventory system's app, and they usually sit outside both Kandji and Rippling IT's scope, managed instead through whatever console your inventory or ERP vendor supplies. Don't expect either platform to solve yard device management. Budget for that separately, and use Kandji or Rippling IT for the counter, office and delivery driver devices that actually fall within their reach.

Start with one branch, not all of them at once. Confirm the branch's POS and ordering software still work correctly after enrollment, document how long the rollout actually took including any support calls, and only then move to the next branch using that documented process. A rollout that works cleanly at branch one and gets rushed at branch six is how a supplier ends up with the same inconsistent, undocumented device sprawl it was trying to fix.

To roll out a platform across branches, follow these steps:

1. Start with one branch instead of all of them at once, and count the devices there first.
2. After enrollment, confirm the branch's POS and ordering software still work correctly.
3. Document how long the rollout actually took, including any support calls it generated.
4. Move to the next branch using that documented process, and build a standard device kit for any new branch before it opens.

Say you're deciding whether to hire a regional ops manager to visit branches and fix device issues in person instead of adopting a central platform. National wage data puts the median salary for a general operations manager at $105,770 a year¹, and that role would still spend a meaningful share of its time on the road rather than actually fixing anything remotely. A platform that lets you push a policy change or lock a lost device from one screen, regardless of which branch it's at, usually saves more time than a traveling ops role would, though the two aren't mutually exclusive at a large enough supplier.

The best time to get a branch's devices right is before it opens for business, not six months later once staff have already improvised their own workarounds. Build a standard device kit for a new branch, POS terminal, office PC, and however many counter devices your format calls for, enrolled and configured before the branch's opening day. Treating device setup as part of new-branch launch, the same way you'd plan signage or inventory, prevents the exact sprawl problem this checklist started with.

Keep that standard kit written down somewhere every future branch manager can find it, not just in the memory of whoever ran the last opening. A supplier that opens branches only once every year or two tends to lose that institutional knowledge between openings, which is exactly how the same standardization work ends up getting redone from scratch each time.