There’s a great story of a young man named Edwards Deming who began thinking differently about quality before most American companies even considered it. The year was 1947 and what he discovered and taught us has somehow been forgotten by just about every...
The last place a kitchen and bath industry professional wants to invest these days isn’t necessarily their kitchen and bath inudstry software. As it turns out, marketing isn’t something that really hits the radar for most cabinet dealers, contractors or...
Yes, we’re in a down market. Intuitively it seems like a good idea to start slashing people and expenses to survive. Indeed that may be a necessary action, but owners need to avoid making an emotional decision and step back for a minute. When many businesses opened...
Way back when I was a child burning ants with my magnifying glass (hey, I’m a boy you know), you guys were submitting purchase orders with no costs because it was just too time consuming to manually figure out line item level costs on the order. This cabinet has...
After you place an order with a manufacturer, we all know you get the dreaded confirm back which salespeople never check. The order is released from the manufacturer and the product is shipped to you. On the truck, a piece of paper called the bill of lading...
Wouldn’t it be nice if there were how-to manuals out there for those in the kitchen and bath industry? Life would be great if you could type “how to run a successful K&B business” into your search engine and get the answers that you seek. Unfortunately, the...
I love that show “America’s Dirtiest Jobs”. I get so grossed out by what it actually takes to make everything work sometimes. I also find it fascinating that people actually do those jobs for a living. Then it made me think about our industry and...
The problem with most cabinet dealers is that owners and managers rarely realize the minutiae that their employees have to go through on a daily basis. They look at costs, sales volume and other things their employees don’t see. You know, business stuff. Take...
No force has had a bigger, faster growing influence over home designing than the television. Over the years, television has become more and more of an influence when it comes to your customers’ kitchen cabinet design choices. Due to the popularity of networks...
Do you ever look around your cabinet dealership and think that there must be an easier way to do things? If so, you’re probably stuck in the past. A number of technological advances have been made during the last couple of decades that solve common problems in...
The kitchen and bath industry is intricate and challenging – we don’t have to tell you that. Because of this, every role within the company is extremely important. From sales representatives to product specialists, each department needs to pull its own...
Although it may not seem like the most obvious request to make of your cabinet manufacturer, asking for a plant tour may be one of the best things you can do as a kitchen and bath professional. Taking a plant tour from your cabinet manufacturers will offer you a...
Deciding how many people to keep on staff can be one of the hardest decisions facing any business owner. Inventory, scheduling, and designs can all be complicated; but ultimately deal only with inanimate objects. Making decisions that involve people, on the other...
You’ve put extensive time and effort into building your business. You’ve spent years putting together a solid team of salespeople. You’ve carefully trained each one in the finer points of kitchen and bath industry sales techniques and, for the most...
Have you ever been in the process of working on a document only to have your computer suddenly crash before you’ve had a chance to save it? Before the auto-recovery feature was added to products, you probably would have lost all of your hard work, causing you to have...
By now you may have heard the much over-used acronym CRM (customer relationship management), or in layman’s terms: software for tracking your leads, opportunities and sales activities. You know, getting your sales team organized. When times were great, not many...
It’s the most vile word ever created. Younger folks have no problem saying it and the older generations steer clear of it like the plague. This little word is the dirtiest, most offensive word in the kitchen and bath industry. It turns heads, creates negativity...
How many people enter your showroom then walk out again, having purchased nothing? You may have spent time with these potential customers, used a variety of sales techniques, and invested your energy, all for nothing. These individuals may have left for a variety of...
In part 1 of this series, I suggested a simple premise on how to think about beating your competition: the dealer who processes the customer’s order most efficiently wins. And I don’t just mean wins long term. You can have numerous short term wins with...
Expanding your inventory to include merchandise that enhances or expands your sales is always a good idea — if it is done properly. Using other merchandise as an added draw for your cabinet line can reap rewards. The addition of countertops, vanity tops,...
The kitchen cabinet sales process winds its way down from the manufacturer, all the way to the consumer. At each stop along the way, there are judgments made about the value, benefits, aesthetics and function of the cabinet line. At any point, there can be either...
It’s clear that the market has been affecting the kitchen cabinet industry. The Kitchen Cabinet Manufacturers Association’s (KCMA) trend of business reports painted a dismal picture, with 2009 taking the biggest hit of an annual decrease of cabinet sales of...
Given today’s economy, kitchen and bath professionals are competing in any way possible to garner the most sales. Logic tells us that the easiest way to attract customers is to cut margin and offer discounts. Because of this, many cabinet dealers and remodelers...
There are always challenges that come with a career in sales – so many that it is often hard to pin down the the exact reasons why you might be failing. In the kitchen and bath industry, sales strategies are usually all over the place. Cabinet salespeople and...
We’ve all encountered them — customers who demand something that you don’t have. How do you deal with them? Do you tell them outright that it is an item you don’t carry? Or, do you jump through a series of hoops to try to fill the order? We all...
