Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/37044
42 • AUGUST 2011 • WORLD FENCE NEWS Cost effective business management BY TOM LUBY, PROFIT BUILDERS INTERNATIONAL SLIDING GATE HARDWARE Carriages Round Post Mount Bracket Track Not long ago I was chatting with an old friend and client of mine in the fencing industry and during the course of the conversation he mentioned to me he recently purchased a business management software program from a company based outside North Amer- ica. Now of course they have fences in the country where this software origi- nated, and good business management is good business management, no mat- ter where you are located or even what business you are engaged in. But still I was curious, especially since as I mentioned my friend was a Dynasty Profiles Your #1 source for Imported PVC and Aluminum Fences We are the largest manufacturer of PVC and Aluminum fences in China. All our products are designed to meet North American standards. We have a dedicated sales office in the US. Buy “direct from the factory overseas”… deal locally with our US office. We make it EASY to buy from Overseas. We extrude 100% virgin material. And offer more than 35 different profiles. All mono– extrusions. No Lead!! We also offer full fabrication facility, with CNC routers, and experienced workers. Now offering the full line of Caps and Accessories from our warehouse in Tennessee. PVC Profiles Pre-Fabricated Fence Panels Post & Picket Caps Ornamental Aluminum Panels Residential, Commercial and Industrial grades. Powder coated with DuPont paint and pre- assembled. Panels available with standard assembly or “Hidden-Screws”. Aluminum Fences Tel. 877-846-0640 info@dynastyfence.net previous client of mine and he knows my services are guaranteed for life and are free after the initial engagement. That being said, his money was spent and I did not want to rain on his parade. I only wanted to encourage his success with the new program, so I asked him to show me the software tools he bought. They were really neat, a 3-D thing-a-ma-jig appeared on the computer screen that kind of reminded me of the Cat in the Hat car, with pop up buttons and curious things every- where. My initial response was, wow, this is really cool looking, and my two year old son would be really impressed as well. Knowing just enough program- ming to be dangerous but not really enough to be able to create anything like this, I knew the program was chock full of sub-programs with circu- lar references to connect every part of your business to the other so it gave the program a magical effect. I was impressed until he told me how much it cost. With the training time, etc. it was going to end up costing him close to six figures – incredible. It was a pretty expensive thing-a-ma-jig, even for a real Dr. Seuss look-alike model. This made me think way back to the mid and early 90s when I took on my first fence consulting job with Miller Fence in Worcester, Massachu- setts. Back then I was not a business consulting business owner but an em- ployee. I was a senior business con- sultant for a very large and very expensive business management con- sulting firm with a few thousand em- ployees based in Chicago. I will not name the company but I know they have been actively solicit- ing clients in the fence industry for years. Miller Fence was my last job working for a major corporation like that, as I was quite tired of seeing the company charge tens and sometimes even hundreds of thousands of dollars for common sense business manage- ment tools, when the same valuable in- formation could, and should, cost much less. This was a perfect example of the old adage “You get what you pay for” not being correct. Sometimes you can pay too much for a good product, as sadly both my friends did. My former employer would charge as much as three or sometimes even four thousand dollars per day for my work, plus expenses, and that was over 15 years ago. I know I am good, but I don’t know if I am that good, ha, ha! One reason big business continued on page 76