It really doesn’t matter if your modular business is 50 years old or fresh off the block, your business probably already has or soon will become stagnant.
In the early years of your company, your business probably doubled year on year for the first few years and as the business owner or leader you’re thinking “I’ve got the Secret Sauce”.
Then about year 3 or 4, a feeling of disappointment hits you that despite how hard you worked, your business hit the same numbers it hit the year before. You and your factory are becoming stagnant.
Let’s face facts. In the beginning, you reacted to every request for your product, everything you touched turned to gold and you were the new kid on the block with the shiny new toy everyone wanted to play with.
Then you weren’t that new kid, someone else was. Your product line has settled in just another product everyone else is copying. You are becoming the poster child for stagnation.
Yes, you are staying busy but it’s doing the same thing over and over ad nauseam. Entrepreneurs love growth, challenges and exploring options. Stagnant ones enjoy their newfound routine. The fire has dwindled to a smoldering lump and what was once a factory looking for new products, procedures and opportunities around every corner have simply settled for staying comfortable.
Here are a few reasons you and your factory are becoming stagnant.
Lack of Capital Investment
In the beginning, the money was flowing in faster than you ever thought possible. Investors loved you and showed it by showering your factory with investment dollars. Think of Katerra’s experience with too much investor money.
Cash flow isn’t enough to grow your business into something bigger and stronger. You need additional cash to fund the expansion. If cash isn’t available to put down a deposit for new premises, or purchase additional equipment or fund new marketing activity, then your business simply can’t grow.
You’ve become stagnant.
Finding New Customers, Not Retaining Old Ones
Every modular factory needs customers to survive. When your company started, you were on the phone, emailing and visiting potential customers showing them your factory and your product line. It was a blast. Every new customer was like a touchdown.
However, there comes a point when you begin losing your older customers and really not caring that you lost them because you are still bringing in a few new customers. But that can’t go on forever. Eventually, there won’t be enough new customers coming on board to replace the ones you’re losing.
Eventually, your enthusiasm for calling, emailing and visiting people will wane because you have a factory to run and don’t have time to look for new customers.
You’ve become stagnant.
“I Got No Plan to Tie Me Down”
Remember the days just before you decided to open your new factory? That was a fun time. Everyone just knew in their gut it was going to be a success. Ideas were thrown around like frisbees with so many being pitched and tossed on the table that soon they were piling up.
Your plans probably changed weekly, if not daily, and everyone was so anxious to get started that any plans were what was discussed last. No formal business plan, marketing plan, or even a sales plan were laid out and even if they were, nobody had time to make sure you adhered to them.
Now you’re 4 years or maybe even 40 years into your business and you still don’t have a written business, marketing or sales plan anyone follows, not even you.
You’ve become stagnant.
Do You Still Want to Grow?
Now that is the real question. Do you want your modular factory to grow beyond what it is now?
How you answer that question will let you and others know if you still want to be that entrepreneur that started your company or are you settling into your role in upper management where slow growth and status quo rules the day.
Do you look at the other people opening factories and think to yourself, “They won’t make it.”
You’ve become stagnant.
One of the hardest things you will ever do in business is figuring out how to stop being stagnant and get that feeling of entrepreneurship restarted. I really wish I had the magic wand to help you but once you get into the quicksand of stagnation, it will probably take you simply relaxing and letting some new people help you get that old feeling back. They’re called Millennials!
You’ll find them if you don’t fall into that trap of becoming your “parent” as these ads from Progressive show!
Related Articles:
- Time To Take Out The Modular Factory Trash
- Change Is Inevitable – Just Watch Your Step!
- “Why Change?” Is Always A Big Question In The Offsite Construction Industry
Gary Fleisher is Editor in Chief of Modular Home Source and the Offsite Builder. Email at modcoach@modcoach
