Who’s that knocking at my door?
Cyber security is a hot topic. It has gone from a bunch of precocious adolescents with too much time on their hands to international spies and criminals. The stories are circulating around the news media about the evil doers who are knocking at our doors to retrieve our identities, our personal data including credit cards [...]
How I learned to play with the Big Boys! (and make money at it)
These days it appears that the entire world is pushing us to do more and more on the internet. Many small businesses feel as if they are being dragged kicking and screaming to levels of technology that is too expensive, too complicated, and too difficult to manage. Perhaps. In today’s world, however, there are solutions [...]
Where’s the peanut!
Every time a new disastrous report comes out about the current salmonella outbreak, I think of all of the food distribution businesses that are in the unenviable situation that they can’t trace the sales of specific items to their specific customers. In other words, “Where’s the peanut!” Product recall has been a fact of business [...]
Maybe it’s time to look ahead
By now everyone that hasn’t been hiding behind the moon has heard the various “experts” tell the world how gloomy the business climate is. Undoubtedly we are collectively in tough times. I have been reading, however, some comments by thinking businessmen that are pushing the concept that this is the perfect time to invest. Craig [...]
Better customer service in a downturn: Managing customer loyalty
Well, now it is official. Everyone is convinced that we are in a down period of the business cycle. What are the things that we should be doing so that we ride this out? It is never easy to manage a distribution business. Prices up and down, employee problems, spiraling costs, vendor relations, and customers [...]
Turning inventory into cash: Inventory control is cash in the bank
My friend, Mike Glover, has told me many times, “Cash is cash and everything else is something else.” That may seem like an odd quote for an inventory management blog, but if you are like most inventory intensive companies, much of your cash is tied up in inventory. The good news is that with a [...]
Software for inventory control & business management
Operating a business successfully in today’s tough environment requires knowledge, tools and advantages like never before. Markets and trends change at a dizzying pace, we are bombarded with data (and most times little information), vendor performance can be erratic and customers expect things faster, better and cheaper. Where do you start? With the control, [...]
Do you have too much inventory?
Ask most most manufacturing, retail or distribution businesses to list their top challenges, and inventory management and control – specifically having the wrong or too much inventory – is always near the top of the list. There are numerous reasons businesses end up with too much inventory: overbuying from fear of potential lost sales; getting a “deal” from a supplier [...]
