Released 06/11/2009
I started to get the feeling that everything had gone quiet - too quite. Feeling rather disconcerted that a few of my usual dealer contacts, including the anonymous Father P Clip, had been a bit out of touch, I proceeded to send out worried emails to make sure they were OK and weren't trapped under a rock somewhere. Turns out, they were all just getting on with business - like they should be.
Although it's been fairly quiet on the news front, they do say, no news can be good news. It seems everyone is seriously getting down to business, and preparing themselves for a New Year that brings with it the gladdest of tidings (read: increased margins and high-value contracts).
I've been up to see a few manufacturers lately, such as ACCO and Newell Rubbermaid, as they prepare for their New Year product launches, and there's definitely more than a fair few innovative products making their way into the January catalogues (including one from ACCO that will make paperclips so last season).
A lot of manufacturers are preparing for an SOS show that will show the world - or at least the UK OP industry - that they most certainly mean business.
One dealer that impressed me recently was Stephen O'Brien of Pure Data Solutions based in Leeds. In my interview with him yesterday for December's issue, he said that instead of battening down the hatches in these economically unsteady times, he's actually giving his sales staff incentives like nobody's business. He gave his top salesperson a whopping bonus of £10,000 last year for selling above and beyond his call of duty, and O'Brien still maintains that these kind of incentives are what allows him to add a £1m to his turnover every year he's been in business. Very impressive.
Other than that, I'm working on a review of IT disties in the industry for December. If you'd like to share your experience - good and bad - with any of the distributors, we'd like to hear about it. Please email whatever you'd be interested in sharing to editor@dealersupport.co.uk.
Bye for now...