Case Studies
Case Studies
(Names changed for privacy and confidentiality.)
John and Peter ran a number of business. Management meetings were non existent. Cost controls were poor. Sales planning and management were ideas never put in place. In one part of the business, it took just six weeks to generate an additional $1,000 a day that more than paid for the project.
John and his three sons couldn’t get along. This turned out to be a family counseling project that got all the members working together again. But it was more about effective delegation of authority, an issue many entrepreneurs struggle with. And John was no exception. But he had to let go in order to keep his sons in the business. How long they would remain that way was up to them.
In among the houses on this quiet waterfront, Billy bought and sold 2 million pounds of lobsters each year. Trucks were constantly in and out of his warehouse, as they took the catch of just a few days, drove them to the major city for shipment to places around the globe – Spain, Korea, Canada, and USA. He did business in a volatile market where he could buy today and sell two days later at a loss. On the other hand, he could also make money in the good season. One of the tasks was to convince the fishermen that middle men were important for the industry, and contrary to popular opinion, did not rip off anyone in order to get the lobsters from the boats to the diners’ plate. And, of course, develop some tools so Billy could monitor the price movements, track his moving averages, and so keep the pressure on selling prices to make sure both he and the fishermen remained in business.
Freddy and his wife were attorneys in a smaller town dealing with bankruptcy court. They cared about people, fought big government, protected their own family assets when necessary, and chased deer on the farm with a Hummer, not a rifle. One of the most delightful consulting projects imaginable.
Harry was stressed. So badly, he disappeared from the business the day after we arrived without telling anyone, including us. We ran the project for the two weeks he had agreed, he returned refreshed and ready to take over a business that had been through a managerial makeover. And, he paid us everything.
David, and his wife Maria, ran a fire door manufacturing plant that was not producing the expected profit. Our evaluation discovered that doors were taking over four hours to manufacture. They should have taken 30 minutes, according to the business owner. We ran some tests and settled at 45 minutes each door. It did not take a genius to fix this one.
Steve and Jane’s electroplating business was causing many, many sleepless nights. Equipment that had almost passed its used by date was breaking down constantly. Customers were complaining about the lateness of the delivery and the poor quality. The re-work was killing the businesses. And high debt levels prevented expenditure on new equipment. We could not save this one.
Michael’s printing business was growing rapidly. But Michael did not know how to properly cost his work. As a result he incorrectly charged his customers too little, thereby denying the business the profits needed to secure the future of the business. We changed his costing method to make sure he covered all expenses and made a profit.
Peter ran a mail order book store that carried inventory equal in value to his annual sales. Yet he could not figure out why he lacked the finances to expand his business or pay his staff well. We helped him understand that it’s not the size of the inventory that is important in mail order selling and showed him a better way to manage inventory.
Terry, on the other hand, had a great business manufacturing aluminum windows. It was taking anywhere up to three weeks for a job to get through the factory floor, a distance of not much more than 60 feet. We showed him how to eliminate this bottleneck and taught him and his staff how to get the jobs finished on time.
Meanwhile, Ray and his brother had fine engineering equipment sitting idle in the recent business downturn. A little creative marketing, however, would see a turnaround even in difficult times.
Pat was completely frustrated by the lack of good financial information from his business . . . information that would help him make quality decisions about the future and what needed to be done. We soon had his staff providing the right information on time, and the business flourished.
Sam was one of the nicest guys you could meet. His cleaning (janitorial) business revenue was about $1.3m a year. He would get commercial cleaning contacts, find subcontractors to do the work, and pocket the difference. But he made one mistake. He listened to the bank and borrowed around $750k when interest rates were low, but they went higher. We arrived on a Monday, and he had sold the family home that weekend to reduce his debt, but still he and his wife were in trouble. She was upset at losing the family home, and he was in tears in front of me as we tried to get things in order. On our second day on the job, his wife asked us to leave because we were costing too much money, she said. I wanted to know if we left, who would fix the problems we had identified in our analysis. “I will”, she replied. So I asked, “Well, if you know how to fix these things, how come you didn’t do it before we arrived?” We don’t know how this one ended. Probably bankruptcy . . . and divorce.
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