Saturday, March 18, 2006

Building Decks in your own backyard

A Greek businessman once told me, “ Do Business in your own back yard “. When questioned about it his point to me was to stay local. Create a business that draws clientele to you. Transportation is expensive, and time on the road is time wasted.

This is the most compelling reason for staying local.

In our area here there are a couple of new deck company start-ups attempting to cover the entire area. They are both marketing themselves as the most creative (they are not),and the least expensive (they are). On top of having higher transportation costs, they have the smallest profit margin (if any). I would warrant a guess that both are utilizing illegal labor, (just a hunch) and sub-standard materials.

They are both marketing hard, pay per click advertising, and I know one is a full time student.

Every year there are a hundred or so start up deck companies—every year most of them go broke. Some survive a while—but rarely do they ever succeed.

This is why I am so proud of our crews.

In the 3 year history of our network, one closed his doors (he was trying to run 3 businesses simultaneously—2 lost money, which tapped the business we were helping him with for money).

Another got cancer and closed the doors, and another picked up and moved to Quebec to fulfill his dream of opening a Hungarian restaurant.

Only 3 have left the network in 3 years… this record is far and beyond the normal 75% business failure rate in the first 3 years that is the standard ratio in Ontario.

I really believe we are building our installation network utilizing the best quality people in our areas.

Well done Gents!

L

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