Business growth - staffing etc.

[handyman]

Hi

 

I provide LED panels, interactive kiosks, display stands for tablets etc for rental for predominately trade shows. Business has slowly grown because it was entirely self funded with just £1000 startup capital and I just reinvested money back into the business and introduced new products.

 

So just coming onto the end of my 2nd year trading and I've got to the stage where I have a modest income. But the trajectory is good - always doing much more trade than the same month from the previous year.

 

Income levels are really up and down. December & Jan are very low trade. August is also non-existent. The surround months are also quite low as well. This is fine for me as I can weather the storms and ensure I trade well during high season.

 

But if I have a full time staff it's a different story altogether. I'm on the stage where I should be hiring additional hands soon. But what worries me is being able to pay people on time.

 

How is hiring generally managed in the event production supply industry? Are all companies dependant on contractors and seasonal workers? I know a pretty big plc who does event management and is one of my clients where the entire workforce are contractors. It's a bit nuts.

 

How do you structure your business?

[StevieR]

The first steps towards employing people is never easy but if you plan the timing and know your overheads and income then it should make your life so much easier and help to increase business as well.

 

We have a small, full time core of staff that we need all year round. We then use freelancers for add-hoc small pieces of work throughout the year and often take on an extra body or two or a short term fixed contract during busy season - that being summer for us.

 

Best of luck with it all.

 

Steve

[handyman]

The first steps towards employing people is never easy but if you plan the timing and know your overheads and income then it should make your life so much easier and help to increase business as well.

 

We have a small, full time core of staff that we need all year round. We then use freelancers for add-hoc small pieces of work throughout the year and often take on an extra body or two or a short term fixed contract during busy season - that being summer for us.

 

Best of luck with it all.

 

Steve

 

Thanks for your input.

 

Yeah, I want to make trade as consistent as possible so the cash flow is good year round. My first port of call is to focus on ideas which I can get trade for the Christmas and Summer seasons. Perhaps wedding equipment for July-August. I flirted with the idea of patio heating hire for the trade. But insurance wants staff to be fully gas safe registered which made the idea unviable. Because gas engineers are in high demand during December & January it's going to be virtually impossible to subcontract these. For the time being I use the low periods to build flight cases, research inventory and do maintenance on equipment that is substandard.

[Stuart91]

Know your numbers.

 

It seems like you have a reasonably good grip of this already, but it's absolutely crucial.

 

Do you have any other regular outgoings, e.g. premises, vehicles, etc.?

 

Would you have enough work for people to do in the quiet months? At this time of year, we are over the Christmas rush, and I have staff busy with repair jobs, tidying up and developing our hire stock, and working on things for the upcoming summer. It doesn't bring in money at the moment, but the cashflow from the busy months tides us over. If you don't have much of that kind of work needing done, temporary or contract staff might be the better way to proceed.

 

As for paying them, traditionally businesses use a bank overdraft to cover cashflow between lean and rich periods. But I'd advise against this if you possibly can - the bank are not your friend, irrespective of what their adverts say, and letting them get their claws into you this way is best avoided.

[kerry davies]

You might need to research the wedding market a bit more. Family members run what was supposed to be holiday lets and conferencing on the Gower but is now a year-round wedding business which is deliriously happy to shut down for one week at Christmas. They still had two weddings between Dec 26 and Jan One.

 

My own work used self-employed casual staff when it got busy. I used to pay above the odds and usually had a choice of good workers that maintained standards and did not make me look bad. They are your representatives as much as anything else.

 

E2A one thing I made sure of was that the staff got paid immediately, there is nothing worse than them having to hang around until I got paid. They weren't running my business and taking the risk. That was my job.

[handyman]

Know your numbers.

 

It seems like you have a reasonably good grip of this already, but it's absolutely crucial.

 

Do you have any other regular outgoings, e.g. premises, vehicles, etc.?

 

Would you have enough work for people to do in the quiet months? At this time of year, we are over the Christmas rush, and I have staff busy with repair jobs, tidying up and developing our hire stock, and working on things for the upcoming summer. It doesn't bring in money at the moment, but the cashflow from the busy months tides us over. If you don't have much of that kind of work needing done, temporary or contract staff might be the better way to proceed.

 

As for paying them, traditionally businesses use a bank overdraft to cover cashflow between lean and rich periods. But I'd advise against this if you possibly can - the bank are not your friend, irrespective of what their adverts say, and letting them get their claws into you this way is best avoided.

 

My approach is I would only hire permanent staff who would pay for themselves during the lowest trade periods of the year. It would be a financial nightmare having to use profits from the high seasons to pay for staff during low seasons. Which is why I want to even out my trade and have something going during December-Jan and July& August - 4 of the quietest months for b2b exhibitions & trade shows which is what I'm supplying to right now.

 

Out of curiosity what was your experience with the banks? I heard so many scare stories about banks pressuring businesses into making decisions that hamper the businesses growth. I know that in our industry we have a lot of cash tied up in assets and banks know this - if they want their money back they can easily force the business to liquidate the stock. Which is why I don't want any debts.

 

A friend of mine had some issues during 2008, he was paying his business loan back on time without any delays. But after 2008 the banks needed to claw funds back from everywhere they can. Bank had a clause in the loan agreement that if business is late at paying their utility bills that would be grounds for them to ask for the entire loan repaid immediately. My friend was a bit casual with paying utility bill and it caught him out. He reckons the actions he took to repay his loans back immediately stalled his business growth by 4 years. He had to downsize drastically to pay it off.

 

You might need to research the wedding market a bit more. Family members run what was supposed to be holiday lets and conferencing on the Gower but is now a year-round wedding business which is deliriously happy to shut down for one week at Christmas. They still had two weddings between Dec 26 and Jan One.

 

My own work used self-employed casual staff when it got busy. I used to pay above the odds and usually had a choice of good workers that maintained standards and did not make me look bad. They are your representatives as much as anything else.

 

E2A one thing I made sure of was that the staff got paid immediately, there is nothing worse than them having to hang around until I got paid. They weren't running my business and taking the risk. That was my job.

 

the b2b trade is consistent and repeat. So we need to always be on alert - ready to take on projects. If we slip up on standards - the client is unlikely to use us again.

 

With weddings they're one offs [touch wood] - if we're supplying AV equipment for weddings we can pick our trade months and just decide to trade during the summer.

 

That's my assumption is anyway - the idea is still on the backburner I have not researched it yet.

[Bobbsy]

Let me throw in an X-Factor...how are you set up for sales and marketing? Would somebody working at least part time on this, likely largely on commission, up your cash flow enough to pay, not just for themselves but also for any extra staffing you might need.

 

Putting my cards on the table, when I first joined technical management for a company, I thought the sales department were a total waste of space. However, then I got to know some of them and, working together--me pointing out our strengths and things we could do and them hauling in the clients, we upped our revenue a lot more than would have happened as a bunch of engineers, no matter how good.

[Jivemaster]

You can't find the right person to afford, without first having some good ideas of who is the right person by skill set. What are your weakest skills? Get them covered first, could likely be office based between you and your accountant, even someone to send out invoices and chase payments.

 

Look around your extended family, is there anyone struggling for a job who would fit your company's needs.

[handyman]

Putting my cards on the table, when I first joined technical management for a company, I thought the sales department were a total waste of space. However, then I got to know some of them and, working together--me pointing out our strengths and things we could do and them hauling in the clients, we upped our revenue a lot more than would have happened as a bunch of engineers, no matter how good.

 

I do everything myself even the book-keeping so have an idea how every aspect of the business fits together. I'm not a people's person and not great at striking rapport with people. But I realise now that relationships and building rapport with your clients is sooo important. For big clients costs aren't so important, quality is debateable - a lot of the time the client just wants things to work - doesn't really care if the video is displayed in 1080p or 4K. What matters is they have good personal relationships with your company and they'll happily keep coming back to you and reorder time and time again.