Manufacturer – Athens GA

A small 40+ year old manufacturer of Spectrophotometers that had about the best product in the world came to me asking for help. It was a family run business and were set in their ways. They were not losing money, they had a good “LifeStyle”; but decided it was time to grow and scale.

Problems

  • Been in business for 43 years the Founder was still active but in total control
  • Good IP but not leveraged for growth
  • 13,000 Contacts in their database but very few re-orders
  • Pipeline of new product was very short – not enough innovation
  • Employee morale was low and too many people leaving
  • Revenue was on a downward spiral
  • Fundamental Weakness — They DO NOT know how to sell

I was initially asked to come and do an assessment. Which I did over a 2 week period. I interviewed all 20 employees, a few customers and spoke with a few of their key partners and vendors who were part of their supply chain.

Opportunities for growth:

  • Get the right people in the right seat of the bus
  • Improve leadership and get more professional employees with a lot more experience
  • Make the Customer Service a profit center
  • Fund R&D and increase innovation and new product development
  • Develop a marketing campaign
  • Develop a structured sales process

Process Improvement

  • Improved the go to market strategy and implement an Education based marketing  campaign.
  • Developed a structured sales process and trained staff on how to follow-it
  • Improved inventory management and cleaned up old inventory which improved our credit rating with the bank and gave us more operating capital.
  • Reduce delivery time from 120+ days to 45-60 days. Which also increase cash-flow and gave us more operating capital=

In conclusion: 

  • Tapped into the genius of staff that had a lot of experience
  • The sales cycle dropped to 60 Days or less from 120 Days
  • They closed a higher % of sales opportunities
  • Increase conversations from existing customers and new customers
  • Grew the company 60% in top line revenue in 18 months