I was very pleased with our survey results and would like to share them with you. We presented this survey to over fourteen thousand food distribution and processing companies over the last few weeks and we learned a lot. Please keep the feedback up we appreciate your interest in our Newsletter.
Are capital expenditures up, down or flat?
22% of respondents have increased capital expenditures.
30% of respondents have had no change in capital expenditures.
48% of respondents have decreased capital expenditures.
This is interesting because capital expenditures are a big indicator of business growth. What this tells us is that while half of the population have slowed growth spending the other half is growing at a steady rate and even more dramatically almost a quarter of you have increased growth spending. Looks like there are a lot of companies out there taking advantage of the depressed prices that come with a down economy to get more growth out of each dollar spent.
Next you answered "What is the most pressing issue facing your business today?" You gave us some great responses and from them we've pulled the following common issues.
- Reducing Labor Costs and Cost of Goods Sold This was by far the most important issue you folks were concerned with.
- WITHOUT laying off employees
- WHILE maintaining high quality product
- WHILE maintaining high customer service
- Maintaining Sales Volume and Customers
- Without sacrificing Profit/Margins
- During this down economy
- Obtaining/Providing Financing and Credit Terms
- Banks and Vendors are making terms tighter
- Customers are harder to collect from
- Motivating and Retaining Employees Really related to number 1 above
Many of these will be topics for future newsletters.
Next you rated four areas that food distributors and processors commonly focus on for business improvement. The areas we asked you to rate were: Healthcare and Benefits, Transportation Expenses, Employee and Labor Cost Management, Government Regulations, and Information Systems.
In list of importance as rated by you:
- Employee and Labor Cost Management - Ranked First Consistent with your most concern issue above
- Transportation Cost Management - Number two
- Healthcare and Benefits - Third
- Government Regulations - A close Fourth
- Information Systems - Computers came in a distant last, with over 70% of the respondents making it their least important issue.
Over the last few years we've noticed a trend in readership rise and fall that coincides with the results of this question. When we talk about cutting costs on labor and transportation we see a readership spike, when we drift off on a tangent about computer automation we see a trough. This coincides with my opinion that computers are tools to make it easier to do business and take care of the important things (numbers 1 through 4).
This brought a question to mind, while you don't place much business importance on the new technology I suspect you'll be surprised how much you are actually using. Next week I will ask you to take one more quick questionnaire about the Internet and how you guys use it. As you know the Internet has and will continue to change the way we do business and communicate with each other. I don't believe a lot of you have the time to tweet with
, but I'm sure you find the Internet useful in other areas. You'll tell us.
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3.26 Copyright (C) 2008 Compojoom.com / Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."
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