# Aspire: Supporting a Slack-Only Client from Microsoft Teams 24/7 incident response for a fast-growing restaurant chain – with full management visibility and no change for the client > Aspire uses Conclude to support a Slack-only client from Teams, cutting response times and giving managers greater visibility Canonical HTML page: https://conclude.io/customer-stories/aspire/ Published: 2026-10-28 Last updated: 2026-10-29 --- Aspire, an IT services and managed services provider, provides 24/7 network support for a retail client that grew from 58 restaurants to around 250 in a year, with around 1,000 expected by the end of 2027. The client uses only Slack, while Aspire uses Microsoft Teams and Cisco Webex. With Conclude, Aspire's team talks to this client from Microsoft Teams, while the client stays in Slack with clear visibility. ## The Challenge In 2025, Aspire took on a major retail client starting with 58 restaurants. Aspire provides 24/7 support, and when a restaurant goes down, the client expects an immediate response – because the restaurant can't run. The client was clear: it was Slack or nothing. Aspire doesn't use Slack, and retraining its team wasn't an option. Until a solution was in place, communication ran through phone calls and email. This led to: * **Slow responses:** the client could go days or weeks without replying to an email, and wasn't always answering phone calls either * **Crowded inboxes:** the client managed email across multiple sites and partners, so nobody was monitoring the inbox and responding promptly * **Urgent requests stuck in email:** even an engineer waiting on site to troubleshoot had to rely on email, with no chat option * **Limited oversight:** managers weren't copied on every email, so they couldn't see how the team was communicating or whether urgent messages were picked up **The result:** delays on time-critical incidents, and frustration on both sides when each was waiting on the other. ## The Solution Aspire already had Microsoft Teams as part of its Office 365 package, so it looked for a tool that could connect Teams and Slack. The team found Conclude on Google, had a demo, ran a test with the client, and chose Conclude for: * **No change for the client:** the client created a new Slack channel for Aspire and approved the connection – nothing else changed on their side * **Fast onboarding:** Aspire set everything up in less than 30 minutes, and a one-hour working session with the client ended in under 15 minutes * **Instant team access:** adding team members in Conclude automatically gave them access to the client conversation * **A layout built for handoffs:** post view keeps each conversation tied to its topic under a subject line, rather than in a running chat ## How Aspire Uses Conclude Aspire's team of 75 and the client's team of around 20 share one connected channel: 1. The client posts in their Slack channel – for example, a restaurant that has gone down 2. Conclude syncs the message to Aspire's Microsoft Teams channel in real time 3. Aspire's team replies from Teams, following the client's protocols, and the reply appears in Slack ### Current Use Cases: * **24/7 incident response:** the client reports restaurant outages and Aspire responds around the clock, including from mobile * **Shift handoffs:** each post carries a subject line with the priority, so anyone logging in – even two days later – can find all communication for a ticket in one place * **Standardized escalations:** subject lines include the severity, case number and site, so the client can see what needs attention before opening the message * **Management oversight:** Aspire's managers and directors are in the channel, so they can check response times and step in when needed * **File sharing:** the team shares attachments with the client directly in the conversation > I'm not on every email that goes out to my customer, but I'm on every message that goes from Teams to the customer through Conclude. I can see how professional my team is, and I can watch response times. I can't do that with email. ## Benefits of Using Conclude * **Full management visibility:** managers see every message that goes from Teams to the client, including tone, professionalism, and response times * **Faster responses:** the client can reply from a meeting, their phone, lunch or the weekend, replacing waits of days or weeks on email * **Better processes:** visibility into the conversation helped Aspire introduce standardized subject lines for critical incidents * **Client confidence:** the client knows managers and directors are on the channel and can reach them directly when needed * **No retraining:** Aspire's team stays in Microsoft Teams, and the client stays in Slack * **Reliability:** Aspire has had no outages from Conclude * **Room to grow:** the client has since expanded its services with Aspire, and a second channel has been proposed for the new scope Conclude lets Aspire meet a Slack-only client where it works, without changing its own tools – and gives Aspire a ready answer for the next client on Slack. > If another customer uses Slack, I can now confidently say: no problem, we can talk to you from Teams.