September 5, 2022 • 30 mins
Let’s face it, businesses today are facing a mountain of challenges, the urge to focus on product sales and not your customers are at an all-time high. Some believe price is the only way to get sales and that quality or focusing on solving customer’s problems is no longer important.
A good business is concerned with the customer's needs and how they can help their customers be successful because they recognize that a successful customer is a return customer. That statement is from our guest today, Jon Gainer, President and owner of Stake World, a manufacturer of yard sign stakes. Jon will share his experience on how focusing on delighting your customers has grown his business in the face of the Pandemic and Supply Chain issues. He shares with us on how this approach works and why more businesses need to adopt this philosophy.
StakeWorld Website: https://www.stakeworld.com/
Small Business Talks Blog : Delighting Customers & Lawn Sign Stakes
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
How does a small businesssucceed in today's environment?
Covet supply chain challenges,finding workers to fill job vacancies.
It's tough trying to stay in businessand meet customer demands.
We had a great opportunity to talk
with John Gainer of Steak World,a manufacturer of yard signed steaks,
and ask them, how do you market and sellan item that's perceived as all the same?
(00:25):
You'll learn about how to delight your
customers for success and how their signstakes are different in a meaningful way.
Today on small business talks,
despite many companies going after being
(00:45):
the cheapest in the market, being the mostsatisfying in the market is far superior.
If the goal is to build a lasting businessmodel, the question shouldn't be what can
I sell my customer, but how can Ibest achieve my customers goals?
Businesses that plan ahead with good
analytics will be moresuccessful in the long run.
(01:06):
If you can figure out your total salesof a particular item and buy it once or
twice a year, you'll make moreprofit throughout the year.
Yard sign stakes are a good example ofthis because they don't expire inflation.
Proofing your business meansstocking up before the prices rise.
It's far more expensive to pleasean unhappy customer that you sold
(01:29):
substandard materials to than it is toconvince a happy customer to buy quality.
With all that in mind,
today we are speaking with John Gainor,president and owner of Steak World Inc.
And we are here to talk about not only
yard signs stakes, but alsoabout delighting your customer.
(01:52):
John, welcome to the podcast.
Thank you for having me.
Good to have you.
So John, simple question whatmakes a good yard sign steak?
At the beginning, I guess you haveto say good quality materials.
Like anything, if you start off with your
base being poor materials, you're notgoing to have a good final product.
(02:16):
And so I think as yard sign stakes go,it's really important.
You start out with a high quality steel.
We see a lot of yard signedstakes hitting the market.
Coming out of China,they usually have a low carbon content,
and it means that they'repretty malleable.
When people try to put their foot on them
(02:37):
to push them into the ground, they bendin the wind and that kind of thing.
So they look good initially,
but you soon find out that you've boughta substandard product,
I think when we talk about what makesa good yard sign stake good materials.
Secondly, what I would sayis you need a good design.
Not all state designs are equal.
(03:01):
And so we really need to think about where
are the stress points,what are actually the goals?
How high do you need your sign to beoff the ground to be effective?
Can you have it a little lower?
Could you use a product that is not weldedand creates weak points at the welds?
So how it's designed,what kind of welds are used on it.
(03:24):
These are all really important questions
when we talk aboutan effective yard sign stake.
Excellent.
And I have put those ones that breakapart on your foot in the ground.
So I have experience with that, knowingexactly what you're talking about.
You have this mangled pieceof metal holding your sign up.
(03:44):
Looks horrible.
There's nothing worse than the one
that you put your foot on the edge stickand you try to push it in and it literally
just gives way and the whole thingkind of bows in around your foot.
I've had that happen.That's right.
Well, and some of that, I mean,that's a pretty standard ten inch by 30
inch frame that's been the marketstandard for a long time.
(04:06):
I personally don't think it's probably
the most effectivesimple because it's super wide.
So you're allowing this little pieceof nine gauge steel to take all the brunt
of £200 pushing on it and it'snot going to hold up to it.
And so we prefer actually ifI were to buy my own steaks.
(04:31):
If you wereI prefer a stake that I can that has
a shorter distance between the polesbecause that means that that horizontal is
not going to be taking asmuch downward pressure.
Okay.That makes complete sense.
One thing I never realized is that whenyou go to have signs for your business or
(04:52):
you're going to go around the neighborhoodand put up signs,
yard signs is that the yard sign generallyis separate from the actual stake.
It's kind of traditionallysold as two separate units.
Right.So if a company were to be smart and say,
okay, I'm going to offer a full package,what things should I consider when selling
my custom yard signsteaks with their signs?
(05:14):
So we have a stake that I think isfar superior to the standard steak.
Now I think everybody's seen the ten inchby 30 inch each frame and we sell those.
We make the best possible ten inchby 30 inch frame that's in the market.
But we actually have a steak that we call
the beefy steak that Ithink is far superior.
(05:37):
I worked on campaigns for about six years
before getting into workingwith yard signed stakes.
And so I was really familiar with all thefailures that the standard stakes had.
You talked about the bottom rung bending,
snapping off at the weldsbeing super high off the ground so
(06:02):
that when the wind hits it, it becomeskind of leans over at a 45 degree angle.
By the end of the campaign and with thecampaigns, what we're selling is image.
And so when we put out something
in the public, we need to makesure it bears up to our image.
(06:22):
Well, our signs leaning over at a 45
degree angle is not greatfor a politician's image.
It doesn't scream quality.
It doesn't scream,I am a stalwart for truth.
It screams, I'll kindof lean over for anything.
One of the things that we looked at wasusing a different type of steel,
(06:44):
a steel that is still goingto fit in the yard sign.
So it's still a nine gauge steel,but a steel that is more resilient.
And I had a manufacturer that we worked
with said, I don't know why you guys usethis low grade steel that's weldable when
you could be using a high carbon steeland just using two singular posts.
(07:06):
And we were super intrigued by that idea.
And that's how we started designingand coming up with the beefy steak.
And we found that when we started testing
it, because we wanted to know,is it really worth
this unassuming new design tryingto revolutionize the market?
And in the end,
(07:27):
we found that using the spring steel,no horizontal
rungs was six times stronger in the windwhen compared to the standard age frame.
And so it meant that our candidates weregoing out and putting their stakes up
and they were staying up and the signswere staying up straight.
(07:50):
And the other thing is,we found they were super easy to ship.
One of the big problems that we had was wewould try to send out the packages
to customersso they would want one sign sent to one
location or five signs sent to onelocation, something like that.
(08:11):
But the age frames would haveto be shipped separately.
So we were doubling our shipping cost.
And so if we were shipping five signsto a location, say it's like a roofing
company,they could actually take the beefy steak
because it wasn't this kindof bulky design that the Hframe is.
(08:31):
They could actually fit the beefy steakcorner to corner on an 18 x 24 inch sign.
They could ship it all in one boxand it was really easy to distribute.
And so as a business,we're thinking about packages and how
to send the multiple partsto a particular marketing campaign.
(08:52):
This made it all in one box.
And so it just saved us tons of money.
And not to mention it wasa better product in the end.
Oh, certainly.Because the quality and the thickness
and things that you've looked at,I think one of the things intrigued me
about your business is the fact you'veactually engineered these things.
Because most people would never thinkthe thought process that goes
(09:15):
into something like that actuallydelivers something.
So, I mean, that's really impressive.I was going to ask,
but I think you've already asked it,but I'm going to ask it anyway.
So when I go online,I see all the different companies.
It seems that whoever gets the lowest,
it seems everybody is focused on priceonly when they get online.
(09:36):
And one of the things I always ask is,how do you compete against that?
How do you compete with companiesthat only sell low price.
And I think you've already touched base,like on quality and things like that.
You want to elaboratea little bit on that?
Yeah.And I've always kind of held to this idea
that a business existsfor selfless reasons.
(09:57):
Any businessman who is out there purely
for profit is going to bean unsuccessful businessman.
A good businessman,a good salesman is concerned
with the customer's needs and how theycan help their customers be successful.
Because they recognize that a successfulcustomer is a return customer.
(10:20):
Exactly.
A successful customeris a return customer.
To just be the most expensivepeople on the market.
We don't need to be the cheapestpeople on the market.
We need to be the people who havethe most satisfied customers.
We need to be the people who helpthe customer be the most successful.
(10:45):
And so when we designed the Beefy Steak,
a lot of what we were thinking abouta lot of what I was thinking about was
my experience when I was out in FrozenStorm, like Iowa, in northern Iowa.
What were the things that I was crying
and moaning about as I triedto put stakes into frozen ground?
(11:06):
Well, obviously thembending and breaking over.
It's super windy up there becausethey have a bunch of lakes.
And our signs bending over,having to go out two,
three times during a campaignand fix the signs, I just hated it.
And so I had a problem to be solved.
And so we really built the Beefy Steakand some of our other products.
(11:31):
We really built themwith customer success in mind.
And it means that we don'tuse cheap foreign steel.
We could buy 1000 stakes from China.
They approach me just about everyday asking us to buy their stuff.
(11:54):
We could sell that stuff and we could bethe cheapest in the market,
but we certainly wouldn't leavebehind the most satisfied customers.
And so I'm far more interested in the long
term relationship of a successful customerthan I am making sure I get the next order
in the sale and just havingmassive customer turnover.
(12:16):
I agree wholeheartedly with you becauseone of the whole goals of both the podcast
is not only to let small business telltheir story and talk to people,
but kind of an underwriting thing is alsothe whole idea of we've got some really
great products made righthere in this country.
And you really before you just sell outbecause you got a couple of pennies
(12:38):
cheaper by buying it from Chinaor buying it on Amazon.
I realize that's kind of focused on that.
Do you ever get people to tell you that,
like, why don't you just go ahead and buyfrom China or buy something from China?
And what is your thoughts on that?
As a small business,we come across it all the time.
(13:00):
We've had several companiesthat do similar things to us.
They sell yard sign steaks,
or they sell signs and they buyjust a ton of steaks every year.
And so we've had a couple of companiessay, hey, let's go in on this 50 50.
They want us to buy a minimum of 100,000
parts because you're fillingup a container with parts.
(13:21):
And so we'll buy 50%, you buy 50%,we can both get a good deal.
My problem with that is thatI have customer loyalty.
And that doesn't meanmy customers are loyal to me.
It means that I'm loyal to my customers.
And I don't want to givemy customers an inferior product.
(13:44):
I want to give them the very bestthat I can do with what I have.
And I think you're always going to have
customers who can find somethingwrong with whatever you're doing.
But I think in general,if I am concerned with my customer
(14:08):
success, then my customers aregoing to be a return customer.
And so I'm just not willing to sacrifice
the qualityto be able to make a few pennies extra.
I don't think it's good business.
No, I agree with you.
And I'm going to throwin a worthless piece of trivia.
(14:30):
Note here is that I actually looked up youalways heard the saying that it's cheaper
to retain your current customers than itis to try and go out and get new people.
It's actually like 25 times more expensiveto go get a new customer than it is
to retain your own customer,but I'm going to stop there and.
Get it is astounding.
(14:52):
When I first came across a statistic,I was thinking kind of like you.
I was thinking,oh, it's two to three times, 25 times.
It's just insane.Numbers.
And it's so simple.
And it really comes down to I think that'sone of the reasons why I'm really glad
you're on is to really talk about not onlyabout the product that you manufacture,
(15:14):
but also the whole idea of the customersuccess and working to delight a customer
because that will pay off in the endversus just going after the profit.
And I really like that.Yeah.
Something that my father,
who's in his mid eighties now,he opened up the first Magnavox store
(15:37):
in Peoria, Illinois,and he and his buddy opened it up.
They just got out of the Navy and theydidn't know what they were doing,
and they were just getting crushedby other television stores in the area.
And so there was thisprogram that came on that was
Dale Carnegie,and you could go to Dale Carnegie seminar
(16:00):
and learn all about hisbest selling techniques.
And now we have
so success is not in selling asmuch of your product as possible.
That's not success.
Success is being the most able to solvecustomers'problems as possible.
(16:22):
So the more that you solve customers
problems, the more you're goingto have returned customers.
And then the product sales,those are just you creating solutions.
So if we see our businesses as solution
creating factories, we would be moresuccessful in the market as a whole.
And so those kind of ideas we try to takewith us as we create new products, per se.
(16:50):
We have a customer who called who said,
I really like the beefy steak,but I would prefer that it wasn't so big.
I want it to be shorter because we want tobe able to link different signs together.
And so we thought, well, can we do that?
(17:10):
And so we designed a productbased on solving this guy's problem.
And that product, we put it on the market.
It was called a writer pin.
We put that product on the market,
and it's one of our best sellers becauseit turns out that by solving his problem,
(17:30):
we actually solved a bunchof other people's problems.
And so we're in the solution industry.
And when we look at it that way,
I think we have the best chancefor success as a business.
One thing I want to ask you,
because we've talked about thisand there's good and bad,
but I always ask people, what can Iexpect for the future of the industry?
(17:52):
What are your thoughts and where do youthink the future is going to go right now?
It's terrifying.
Yeah.
I think we're all in agreement of thatbecause we're all trying to figure out
I think the biggest thing is we'rewaiting for the other shoe to drop type.
Yeah,I think we've done the right thing by
(18:18):
trying to get the best qualityby going to us steel manufacturers.
I think the overall costof steel is going to go up.
It's been going up.
I mean we would go a year or twowithout a rise in raw material costs.
(18:42):
Back in, say, 2018, an eon ago,
we would go a year or two withouta rise in material costs.
In 2000 and 22,021 and 2022, we'vehad a rise in our raw material costs.
Every three months,
(19:07):
we take the profit marginsdown as much as you can.
You try to reinventthe manufacturing process.
Can we run this through one machineinstead of two to try to save money?
But in the end,when raw material costs go up by
almost 50%, now,there's not a lot you can do about it.
(19:30):
Now, I'll say this,it has slowed down the rises in cost.
I think where we're at right nowwill be that way for the next six months.
But come this December, January, February,I think we're going to see another rise.
(19:55):
And it pains me every time a customercalls and says it costs how much?
I used to pay $60 for these things.
It pains me because there's really nothingyou can do about the rise in cost.
I think it's going to level out a little
bit, but it's never goingto go back to where it was.
(20:20):
This is the new normal.
I do think something was brought up when
we opened up the podcast was alsothe concept that if you buy in bulk now,
correct me if I'm wrong,yard signed stakes do not expire correct.
They don't get moldy.
(20:40):
They don't lose their taste.
Not a sales pitch.
I'm not trying to pitch.
They taste bad when they come off
the press, and they will tastebad after years and years.
And we try to tell the customer,
if you can look at your year,let's say you have a sign shop.
(21:01):
If you can look at your year and say,okay, we're going to produce 30,000 signs,
and keeping in mind, hopefully you'vegot the storage space to keep them.
You really want to buy those mistakes allat once because
(21:22):
the amount of discount you receive,I mean, if it's too
over $30,000 cards, well,that's a substantial amount of money
that you have brought in that you canuse other places in your company.
And so we try to emphasize that the moreyou're getting, it's easier for us.
(21:49):
It's easier for us to ship.
It's easier for us to pack.
The amount of time we spend on handlingpackages is astronomical.
And so it all cuts down on the cost.
And so if we can ship in bulk,the savings is substantial.
(22:09):
That's really the businesses that are
going to succeed in this new and a littleterrifying new world
are going to be the businesses that knowhow to plan ahead,
that know how to do good risk management,that know how to look at the year
and estimate what they're going to selland then can buy ahead of time.
(22:34):
Those are the businesses that are going
to succeed, and there's really no reasonnot to do it,
especially with the massive offers thatthe credit card companies will give you.
It's kind of a no brainer.
You're going to save 10%, 20% on a product
(22:57):
even if you have to paythe credit card company 5%.
It's a financial no brainer.
Well, I think the other thing that popsinto my head because I saw this with a lot
of both customers and them sellingto people is with COVID or with the supply
chain situation, that doesn't matterwhat the price was, it's not available.
(23:23):
And that's something that I've got.
Certain companies, it's likethey just cannot get anything.
And it's like if you had purchased
and knew that you were going to have thismuch for the whole year, get it now.
That way you're protected from,or I shouldn't say complete protection,
but it offers some more assurance that wecan continue our work versus, I'm sorry,
(23:44):
we have to close up our shop because wecan't get this particular item or another.
Yeah, I think if people looked at buyingfor the year or even six months,
if they looked at it as,yes, this is going to cost me a little bit
upfront, but it's going to help mein the end, if they looked at it like
(24:05):
insurance,how much would you pay in insurance to
ensure that you would be able to supplyyour customers all year long?
Exactly.
I mean, people would payhundreds of dollars
if I could guarantee that you'd be ableto supply your customers all year long.
One was the roughest year.
(24:32):
2020 was rough, but 2021 was even rougherbecause we had major product lines
where we can't get the steelto produce a particular product line.
So a lot ofcertain particular products that weren't
as popular that we can't manufacturebecause we can't get the steel.
(24:56):
And so we've kind of focused on producing
the most popular product lines,the Ten X Beefy Steaks,
and some of the less popular productlines, like the 24 inch H frames.
We've kind of said, okay,
(25:17):
that'll have to go by the wayside becausewe're still supplying orders that were
months out before,and that's going to taper off.
I feel good that we're getting caught upand we're going to be able to have
probably by the end of the year,we'll have our full product line back up.
(25:37):
But anybody who bought a proper amount.
Who estimated their year.
They got a better price.
They got more assurance that they were
going to be able to supplytheir customers.
Andthey were significantly more successful
because not only did they get a betterprice because they bought in bulk.
(26:01):
But when the prices wentup every three months.
They were still using the pricesthat they got back in January.
Right.
And so they just made huge profits becausethey just could go along with the market.
Everybody else is makinga 25% markup on a product.
They're making a 50% markup on the product
(26:23):
because they bought early and theyestimated the year out in front of them.
You're intentional, not reactionary.
No, I agree wholeheartedly.
I agree wholeheartedly.
So we're going to wrap this up by giving
you the floor and any final thoughts,anything that you'd like to mention,
anything on your mind,any creative uses of yard signed stakes.
(26:51):
We get some weird ones,
some phone calls where you're like,he wants to do what with these
people building garden fenceswith okay, that's a new one.
I've never heard that one before.
That is a new one.
We had one customer,he was hanging sports banners and he
(27:13):
wanted to use the steak to be the weighton the bottom of his sports banner.
And because it's made out of a spring
steel, it's significantly heavier thanthe wire that we use for H frames.
And so he's like, oh, this will beperfect to hang these banners with.
(27:34):
So he bought like 1000 of them for thesebanners that he was putting out.
But now I guess I just want to reiteratekind of some of the hallmarks, I think,
of good business,and that is being a selfless businessman.
If your goals are the success of your
(27:56):
company, the success of your customer,you will find success for your company.
And if you can estimate and analyze yourupcoming year, your upcoming usage,
and you can get that in bulk,you will always come out ahead.
Always.
And when we look at the volatile marketthat we're in right now,
(28:20):
the pandemic postpandemic market,this advice becomes even more important.
If you can estimate out ahead of time,you'll come out ahead.
And so with that, we wisheverybody good success.
If you're looking for yard signed stakes,
(28:42):
if you're looking for a company to helpyou come up with solutions,
we want to be that companythat helps you be successful.
And that is what we're going for.Thank you, John.
And one of the things we're going to do is
we're going to put your web addressright below in the description,
right below this podcast so that peoplecan go in there and be able to go to that.
(29:06):
Thank you for, and I mean this sincerely,an inspirational talk.
It has been really impressive to hear
the views that you have and to kind ofshare that with a lot of our listeners.
I think that's really important becauseyour thoughts are very similar to the way
I look at things and tryingto help people out.
(29:26):
And like I said, that's the whole purpose
of this podcast is to try and sharethe knowledge and give people the right
direction and give them advicefrom people on something like that.
Absolutely.So John, thank you very much.
Like I said, we'll have your web addressin the description listed below.
(29:47):
If you like our podcast, we'd ask youto subscribe because this is the type.
What you're hearing right now is
indicative of what we want to bringinto our podcast environment.
So, John, thank you verymuch for your time.
Thank you.And you're inspiration.
And thank you everyone, for listening.Thank you.
How does a small businesssucceed in today's environment?
Covet supply chain challenges,finding workers to fill job vacancies.
It's tough trying to stay in businessand meet customer demands.
We had a great opportunity to talk
with John Gainer of Steak World,a manufacturer of yard signed steaks,
and ask them, how do you market and sellan item that's perceived as all the same?
(00:25):
You'll learn about how to delight your
customers for success and how their signstakes are different in a meaningful way.
Today on small business talks,
despite many companies going after being
(00:45):
the cheapest in the market, being the mostsatisfying in the market is far superior.
If the goal is to build a lasting businessmodel, the question shouldn't be what can
I sell my customer, but how can Ibest achieve my customers goals?
Businesses that plan ahead with good
analytics will be moresuccessful in the long run.
(01:06):
If you can figure out your total salesof a particular item and buy it once or
twice a year, you'll make moreprofit throughout the year.
Yard sign stakes are a good example ofthis because they don't expire inflation.
Proofing your business meansstocking up before the prices rise.
It's far more expensive to pleasean unhappy customer that you sold
(01:29):
substandard materials to than it is toconvince a happy customer to buy quality.
With all that in mind,
today we are speaking with John Gainor,president and owner of Steak World Inc.
And we are here to talk about not only
yard signs stakes, but alsoabout delighting your customer.
(01:52):
John, welcome to the podcast.
Thank you for having me.
Good to have you.
So John, simple question whatmakes a good yard sign steak?
At the beginning, I guess you haveto say good quality materials.
Like anything, if you start off with your
base being poor materials, you're notgoing to have a good final product.
(02:16):
And so I think as yard sign stakes go,it's really important.
You start out with a high quality steel.
We see a lot of yard signedstakes hitting the market.
Coming out of China,they usually have a low carbon content,
and it means that they'repretty malleable.
When people try to put their foot on them
(02:37):
to push them into the ground, they bendin the wind and that kind of thing.
So they look good initially,
but you soon find out that you've boughta substandard product,
I think when we talk about what makesa good yard sign stake good materials.
Secondly, what I would sayis you need a good design.
Not all state designs are equal.
(03:01):
And so we really need to think about where
are the stress points,what are actually the goals?
How high do you need your sign to beoff the ground to be effective?
Can you have it a little lower?
Could you use a product that is not weldedand creates weak points at the welds?
So how it's designed,what kind of welds are used on it.
(03:24):
These are all really important questions
when we talk aboutan effective yard sign stake.
Excellent.
And I have put those ones that breakapart on your foot in the ground.
So I have experience with that, knowingexactly what you're talking about.
You have this mangled pieceof metal holding your sign up.
(03:44):
Looks horrible.
There's nothing worse than the one
that you put your foot on the edge stickand you try to push it in and it literally
just gives way and the whole thingkind of bows in around your foot.
I've had that happen.That's right.
Well, and some of that, I mean,that's a pretty standard ten inch by 30
inch frame that's been the marketstandard for a long time.
(04:06):
I personally don't think it's probably
the most effectivesimple because it's super wide.
So you're allowing this little pieceof nine gauge steel to take all the brunt
of £200 pushing on it and it'snot going to hold up to it.
And so we prefer actually ifI were to buy my own steaks.
(04:31):
If you wereI prefer a stake that I can that has
a shorter distance between the polesbecause that means that that horizontal is
not going to be taking asmuch downward pressure.
Okay.That makes complete sense.
One thing I never realized is that whenyou go to have signs for your business or
(04:52):
you're going to go around the neighborhoodand put up signs,
yard signs is that the yard sign generallyis separate from the actual stake.
It's kind of traditionallysold as two separate units.
Right.So if a company were to be smart and say,
okay, I'm going to offer a full package,what things should I consider when selling
my custom yard signsteaks with their signs?
(05:14):
So we have a stake that I think isfar superior to the standard steak.
Now I think everybody's seen the ten inchby 30 inch each frame and we sell those.
We make the best possible ten inchby 30 inch frame that's in the market.
But we actually have a steak that we call
the beefy steak that Ithink is far superior.
(05:37):
I worked on campaigns for about six years
before getting into workingwith yard signed stakes.
And so I was really familiar with all thefailures that the standard stakes had.
You talked about the bottom rung bending,
snapping off at the weldsbeing super high off the ground so
(06:02):
that when the wind hits it, it becomeskind of leans over at a 45 degree angle.
By the end of the campaign and with thecampaigns, what we're selling is image.
And so when we put out something
in the public, we need to makesure it bears up to our image.
(06:22):
Well, our signs leaning over at a 45
degree angle is not greatfor a politician's image.
It doesn't scream quality.
It doesn't scream,I am a stalwart for truth.
It screams, I'll kindof lean over for anything.
One of the things that we looked at wasusing a different type of steel,
(06:44):
a steel that is still goingto fit in the yard sign.
So it's still a nine gauge steel,but a steel that is more resilient.
And I had a manufacturer that we worked
with said, I don't know why you guys usethis low grade steel that's weldable when
you could be using a high carbon steeland just using two singular posts.
(07:06):
And we were super intrigued by that idea.
And that's how we started designingand coming up with the beefy steak.
And we found that when we started testing
it, because we wanted to know,is it really worth
this unassuming new design tryingto revolutionize the market?
And in the end,
(07:27):
we found that using the spring steel,no horizontal
rungs was six times stronger in the windwhen compared to the standard age frame.
And so it meant that our candidates weregoing out and putting their stakes up
and they were staying up and the signswere staying up straight.
(07:50):
And the other thing is,we found they were super easy to ship.
One of the big problems that we had was wewould try to send out the packages
to customersso they would want one sign sent to one
location or five signs sent to onelocation, something like that.
(08:11):
But the age frames would haveto be shipped separately.
So we were doubling our shipping cost.
And so if we were shipping five signsto a location, say it's like a roofing
company,they could actually take the beefy steak
because it wasn't this kindof bulky design that the Hframe is.
(08:31):
They could actually fit the beefy steakcorner to corner on an 18 x 24 inch sign.
They could ship it all in one boxand it was really easy to distribute.
And so as a business,we're thinking about packages and how
to send the multiple partsto a particular marketing campaign.
(08:52):
This made it all in one box.
And so it just saved us tons of money.
And not to mention it wasa better product in the end.
Oh, certainly.Because the quality and the thickness
and things that you've looked at,I think one of the things intrigued me
about your business is the fact you'veactually engineered these things.
Because most people would never thinkthe thought process that goes
(09:15):
into something like that actuallydelivers something.
So, I mean, that's really impressive.I was going to ask,
but I think you've already asked it,but I'm going to ask it anyway.
So when I go online,I see all the different companies.
It seems that whoever gets the lowest,
it seems everybody is focused on priceonly when they get online.
(09:36):
And one of the things I always ask is,how do you compete against that?
How do you compete with companiesthat only sell low price.
And I think you've already touched base,like on quality and things like that.
You want to elaboratea little bit on that?
Yeah.And I've always kind of held to this idea
that a business existsfor selfless reasons.
(09:57):
Any businessman who is out there purely
for profit is going to bean unsuccessful businessman.
A good businessman,a good salesman is concerned
with the customer's needs and how theycan help their customers be successful.
Because they recognize that a successfulcustomer is a return customer.
(10:20):
Exactly.
A successful customeris a return customer.
To just be the most expensivepeople on the market.
We don't need to be the cheapestpeople on the market.
We need to be the people who havethe most satisfied customers.
We need to be the people who helpthe customer be the most successful.
(10:45):
And so when we designed the Beefy Steak,
a lot of what we were thinking abouta lot of what I was thinking about was
my experience when I was out in FrozenStorm, like Iowa, in northern Iowa.
What were the things that I was crying
and moaning about as I triedto put stakes into frozen ground?
(11:06):
Well, obviously thembending and breaking over.
It's super windy up there becausethey have a bunch of lakes.
And our signs bending over,having to go out two,
three times during a campaignand fix the signs, I just hated it.
And so I had a problem to be solved.
And so we really built the Beefy Steakand some of our other products.
(11:31):
We really built themwith customer success in mind.
And it means that we don'tuse cheap foreign steel.
We could buy 1000 stakes from China.
They approach me just about everyday asking us to buy their stuff.
(11:54):
We could sell that stuff and we could bethe cheapest in the market,
but we certainly wouldn't leavebehind the most satisfied customers.
And so I'm far more interested in the long
term relationship of a successful customerthan I am making sure I get the next order
in the sale and just havingmassive customer turnover.
(12:16):
I agree wholeheartedly with you becauseone of the whole goals of both the podcast
is not only to let small business telltheir story and talk to people,
but kind of an underwriting thing is alsothe whole idea of we've got some really
great products made righthere in this country.
And you really before you just sell outbecause you got a couple of pennies
(12:38):
cheaper by buying it from Chinaor buying it on Amazon.
I realize that's kind of focused on that.
Do you ever get people to tell you that,
like, why don't you just go ahead and buyfrom China or buy something from China?
And what is your thoughts on that?
As a small business,we come across it all the time.
(13:00):
We've had several companiesthat do similar things to us.
They sell yard sign steaks,
or they sell signs and they buyjust a ton of steaks every year.
And so we've had a couple of companiessay, hey, let's go in on this 50 50.
They want us to buy a minimum of 100,000
parts because you're fillingup a container with parts.
(13:21):
And so we'll buy 50%, you buy 50%,we can both get a good deal.
My problem with that is thatI have customer loyalty.
And that doesn't meanmy customers are loyal to me.
It means that I'm loyal to my customers.
And I don't want to givemy customers an inferior product.
(13:44):
I want to give them the very bestthat I can do with what I have.
And I think you're always going to have
customers who can find somethingwrong with whatever you're doing.
But I think in general,if I am concerned with my customer
(14:08):
success, then my customers aregoing to be a return customer.
And so I'm just not willing to sacrifice
the qualityto be able to make a few pennies extra.
I don't think it's good business.
No, I agree with you.
And I'm going to throwin a worthless piece of trivia.
(14:30):
Note here is that I actually looked up youalways heard the saying that it's cheaper
to retain your current customers than itis to try and go out and get new people.
It's actually like 25 times more expensiveto go get a new customer than it is
to retain your own customer,but I'm going to stop there and.
Get it is astounding.
(14:52):
When I first came across a statistic,I was thinking kind of like you.
I was thinking,oh, it's two to three times, 25 times.
It's just insane.Numbers.
And it's so simple.
And it really comes down to I think that'sone of the reasons why I'm really glad
you're on is to really talk about not onlyabout the product that you manufacture,
(15:14):
but also the whole idea of the customersuccess and working to delight a customer
because that will pay off in the endversus just going after the profit.
And I really like that.Yeah.
Something that my father,
who's in his mid eighties now,he opened up the first Magnavox store
(15:37):
in Peoria, Illinois,and he and his buddy opened it up.
They just got out of the Navy and theydidn't know what they were doing,
and they were just getting crushedby other television stores in the area.
And so there was thisprogram that came on that was
Dale Carnegie,and you could go to Dale Carnegie seminar
(16:00):
and learn all about hisbest selling techniques.
And now we have
so success is not in selling asmuch of your product as possible.
That's not success.
Success is being the most able to solvecustomers'problems as possible.
(16:22):
So the more that you solve customers
problems, the more you're goingto have returned customers.
And then the product sales,those are just you creating solutions.
So if we see our businesses as solution
creating factories, we would be moresuccessful in the market as a whole.
And so those kind of ideas we try to takewith us as we create new products, per se.
(16:50):
We have a customer who called who said,
I really like the beefy steak,but I would prefer that it wasn't so big.
I want it to be shorter because we want tobe able to link different signs together.
And so we thought, well, can we do that?
(17:10):
And so we designed a productbased on solving this guy's problem.
And that product, we put it on the market.
It was called a writer pin.
We put that product on the market,
and it's one of our best sellers becauseit turns out that by solving his problem,
(17:30):
we actually solved a bunchof other people's problems.
And so we're in the solution industry.
And when we look at it that way,
I think we have the best chancefor success as a business.
One thing I want to ask you,
because we've talked about thisand there's good and bad,
but I always ask people, what can Iexpect for the future of the industry?
(17:52):
What are your thoughts and where do youthink the future is going to go right now?
It's terrifying.
Yeah.
I think we're all in agreement of thatbecause we're all trying to figure out
I think the biggest thing is we'rewaiting for the other shoe to drop type.
Yeah,I think we've done the right thing by
(18:18):
trying to get the best qualityby going to us steel manufacturers.
I think the overall costof steel is going to go up.
It's been going up.
I mean we would go a year or twowithout a rise in raw material costs.
(18:42):
Back in, say, 2018, an eon ago,
we would go a year or two withouta rise in material costs.
In 2000 and 22,021 and 2022, we'vehad a rise in our raw material costs.
Every three months,
(19:07):
we take the profit marginsdown as much as you can.
You try to reinventthe manufacturing process.
Can we run this through one machineinstead of two to try to save money?
But in the end,when raw material costs go up by
almost 50%, now,there's not a lot you can do about it.
(19:30):
Now, I'll say this,it has slowed down the rises in cost.
I think where we're at right nowwill be that way for the next six months.
But come this December, January, February,I think we're going to see another rise.
(19:55):
And it pains me every time a customercalls and says it costs how much?
I used to pay $60 for these things.
It pains me because there's really nothingyou can do about the rise in cost.
I think it's going to level out a little
bit, but it's never goingto go back to where it was.
(20:20):
This is the new normal.
I do think something was brought up when
we opened up the podcast was alsothe concept that if you buy in bulk now,
correct me if I'm wrong,yard signed stakes do not expire correct.
They don't get moldy.
(20:40):
They don't lose their taste.
Not a sales pitch.
I'm not trying to pitch.
They taste bad when they come off
the press, and they will tastebad after years and years.
And we try to tell the customer,
if you can look at your year,let's say you have a sign shop.
(21:01):
If you can look at your year and say,okay, we're going to produce 30,000 signs,
and keeping in mind, hopefully you'vegot the storage space to keep them.
You really want to buy those mistakes allat once because
(21:22):
the amount of discount you receive,I mean, if it's too
over $30,000 cards, well,that's a substantial amount of money
that you have brought in that you canuse other places in your company.
And so we try to emphasize that the moreyou're getting, it's easier for us.
(21:49):
It's easier for us to ship.
It's easier for us to pack.
The amount of time we spend on handlingpackages is astronomical.
And so it all cuts down on the cost.
And so if we can ship in bulk,the savings is substantial.
(22:09):
That's really the businesses that are
going to succeed in this new and a littleterrifying new world
are going to be the businesses that knowhow to plan ahead,
that know how to do good risk management,that know how to look at the year
and estimate what they're going to selland then can buy ahead of time.
(22:34):
Those are the businesses that are going
to succeed, and there's really no reasonnot to do it,
especially with the massive offers thatthe credit card companies will give you.
It's kind of a no brainer.
You're going to save 10%, 20% on a product
(22:57):
even if you have to paythe credit card company 5%.
It's a financial no brainer.
Well, I think the other thing that popsinto my head because I saw this with a lot
of both customers and them sellingto people is with COVID or with the supply
chain situation, that doesn't matterwhat the price was, it's not available.
(23:23):
And that's something that I've got.
Certain companies, it's likethey just cannot get anything.
And it's like if you had purchased
and knew that you were going to have thismuch for the whole year, get it now.
That way you're protected from,or I shouldn't say complete protection,
but it offers some more assurance that wecan continue our work versus, I'm sorry,
(23:44):
we have to close up our shop because wecan't get this particular item or another.
Yeah, I think if people looked at buyingfor the year or even six months,
if they looked at it as,yes, this is going to cost me a little bit
upfront, but it's going to help mein the end, if they looked at it like
(24:05):
insurance,how much would you pay in insurance to
ensure that you would be able to supplyyour customers all year long?
Exactly.
I mean, people would payhundreds of dollars
if I could guarantee that you'd be ableto supply your customers all year long.
One was the roughest year.
(24:32):
2020 was rough, but 2021 was even rougherbecause we had major product lines
where we can't get the steelto produce a particular product line.
So a lot ofcertain particular products that weren't
as popular that we can't manufacturebecause we can't get the steel.
(24:56):
And so we've kind of focused on producing
the most popular product lines,the Ten X Beefy Steaks,
and some of the less popular productlines, like the 24 inch H frames.
We've kind of said, okay,
(25:17):
that'll have to go by the wayside becausewe're still supplying orders that were
months out before,and that's going to taper off.
I feel good that we're getting caught upand we're going to be able to have
probably by the end of the year,we'll have our full product line back up.
(25:37):
But anybody who bought a proper amount.
Who estimated their year.
They got a better price.
They got more assurance that they were
going to be able to supplytheir customers.
Andthey were significantly more successful
because not only did they get a betterprice because they bought in bulk.
(26:01):
But when the prices wentup every three months.
They were still using the pricesthat they got back in January.
Right.
And so they just made huge profits becausethey just could go along with the market.
Everybody else is makinga 25% markup on a product.
They're making a 50% markup on the product
(26:23):
because they bought early and theyestimated the year out in front of them.
You're intentional, not reactionary.
No, I agree wholeheartedly.
I agree wholeheartedly.
So we're going to wrap this up by giving
you the floor and any final thoughts,anything that you'd like to mention,
anything on your mind,any creative uses of yard signed stakes.
(26:51):
We get some weird ones,
some phone calls where you're like,he wants to do what with these
people building garden fenceswith okay, that's a new one.
I've never heard that one before.
That is a new one.
We had one customer,he was hanging sports banners and he
(27:13):
wanted to use the steak to be the weighton the bottom of his sports banner.
And because it's made out of a spring
steel, it's significantly heavier thanthe wire that we use for H frames.
And so he's like, oh, this will beperfect to hang these banners with.
(27:34):
So he bought like 1000 of them for thesebanners that he was putting out.
But now I guess I just want to reiteratekind of some of the hallmarks, I think,
of good business,and that is being a selfless businessman.
If your goals are the success of your
(27:56):
company, the success of your customer,you will find success for your company.
And if you can estimate and analyze yourupcoming year, your upcoming usage,
and you can get that in bulk,you will always come out ahead.
Always.
And when we look at the volatile marketthat we're in right now,
(28:20):
the pandemic postpandemic market,this advice becomes even more important.
If you can estimate out ahead of time,you'll come out ahead.
And so with that, we wisheverybody good success.
If you're looking for yard signed stakes,
(28:42):
if you're looking for a company to helpyou come up with solutions,
we want to be that companythat helps you be successful.
And that is what we're going for.Thank you, John.
And one of the things we're going to do is
we're going to put your web addressright below in the description,
right below this podcast so that peoplecan go in there and be able to go to that.
(29:06):
Thank you for, and I mean this sincerely,an inspirational talk.
It has been really impressive to hear
the views that you have and to kind ofshare that with a lot of our listeners.
I think that's really important becauseyour thoughts are very similar to the way
I look at things and tryingto help people out.
(29:26):
And like I said, that's the whole purpose
of this podcast is to try and sharethe knowledge and give people the right
direction and give them advicefrom people on something like that.
Absolutely.So John, thank you very much.
Like I said, we'll have your web addressin the description listed below.
(29:47):
If you like our podcast, we'd ask youto subscribe because this is the type.
What you're hearing right now is
indicative of what we want to bringinto our podcast environment.
So, John, thank you verymuch for your time.
Thank you.And you're inspiration.
And thank you everyone, for listening.Thank you.
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