Case Study: Goodwill of Central Texas achieves increased network resilience and simplified centralized management with Fortinet Secure SD-Branch

Goodwill Central Texas Increases Network Resilience With Fortinet Secure SD-Branch

Goodwill Central Texas, an Austin‑based nonprofit operating 37 thrift stores, warehouses and an e‑commerce operation, faced a fragile, costly network built on MPLS that routed all traffic through headquarters. That single point of failure, plus public Wi‑Fi exposure and the need to support 1,100 users with minimal IT staff, created performance, security and budget challenges that threatened retail and revenue-generating operations.

The organization deployed Fortinet Secure SD‑Branch—including FortiGate SD‑WAN, FortiSwitch, FortiAP, FortiManager/FortiAnalyzer, FortiAuthenticator, FortiClient EMS and FortiMail—to centralize management and edge security. The new design gives each site direct internet egress with dual broadband/4G backup, enables one‑pane scripting and device updates, segments Wi‑Fi, improved threat visibility (helping stop a DoS attack), and delivered roughly double internet capacity at about half the cost of the legacy MPLS, increasing resilience and uptime to better support Goodwill’s mission.

Goodwill of Central Texas

Chris Dennick

IT Manager