You’ve certainly heard all kinds of motivational sayings during your business life that are meant to keep you moving onward and upward during challenging times such as: “When the going gets tough, the tough get going,” “A rolling stone gathers no moss” and any others you want to muster up. But one thing we can’t ignore is the Darwinian theory of evolution as it relates to business, this taken from a comment by John Markman the financial writer, who said, “Evolution favors the most adaptable; not the smartest, fastest or strongest.” In my opinion nothing could be truer. I created a business based on this statement that is unique in the industry. You don’t have to be the smartest, most educated, most articulate, strongest or fastest. In fact it bodes well to be a little ignorant so that you won’t think you can’t do something. Norman Vincent Peale said, “Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.” In these challenging times you have to think and act like the day you started in business. You have to be hungry, passionate, ambitious and tireless. You have to get out of any comfort zone you may have been in and fight to survive. You have to be willing to do whatever it takes to make things happen, open your mind to out of bounds thinking and see and grasp every opportunity. The words can’t or no should not exist in your vocabulary.
You have to know the products you sell better than your competition, you’ve got to carry the products consumers want, you’ve got to have a store people will want to shop for floorcovering in and make the experience pleasant. Right now people want the best they can get, sure maybe at a discount but they still want it. You have to do whatever it takes to deliver to them what they want. How do you know what consumers want today? Pay attention to everything you can that conveys this message. Read and listen as much as you can to absorb the information like a sponge. You can go on the internet and Google stuff to learn more and you’ll be surprised at the ideas you may pick up to improve your business. If you’re really good and you know what to offer and how, you’re business will actually grow and prosper.
Not everyone is suffering in this economy. I talk to all sorts of people in the flooring industry everyday; residential and commercial dealers, architects, designers and end users. Flooring is still being sold, the market has not dried up, things are happening. Things may not be occurring at a galloping pace but they are plodding along and today plodding is good.
So what do you have to do? Same thing you should have been doing all along; sell the right product into the right place, using the correct components – cushion, adhesive, floor prep – make sure it’s installed correctly by using installers who know what they’re doing. Cheap installers will cost you more in the long run and your complaints and claims will increase hurting your business. You should have more time to coddle the customer, build your team – it might be smaller but it can be better – build relationships, clean up the store or do anything you can to make the buying experience the best it can be.
Claims and complaints should be avoided like the plague. If you get one find out why, learn from it and fix it. Don’t make the same mistake twice. Now’s the time to be better than you’ve ever been, to fix all the things that have broken in the business and get back to being hungry again. Maybe we all needed this slap to wake us up but remember survival will go to the most adaptable; you may even thrive. If I can help let me know.
Author: Lewis G. Migliore
LGM and Associates – The Floorcovering Experts