Putting Your Customers' Needs First

o Customer Impact – number of accounts/items/dollars by market segment

Perhaps the most important concern that should be addressed is the impact that any proposed brand change(s) may have on the customers in your various market segments. There are likely numerous drawings and labels and documentation changes, catalog revisions, collateral material updates, new training, etc. that must be dealt with within your company anytime you go through a major brand consolidation…but the real concern should be the imposition you place on your customers, distributor partners and/or end users when you elect to make such changes. Even brand changes (if you plan to keep the existing catalog number and UPC codes) can create an adverse impact with your partners and end users. To aid in this brand consolidation analysis, a company should look at their brand sales for each market segment by year listing the number of customer account locations served, the number of catalog numbers sold, the quantity sold and the sales value. This type of summary table will enable the decisionmakers to better gauge the impact on a given market and account base depending upon what decision(s) are ultimately made. One issue that should not be overlooked is how much effort your company will need to put forth in attempting to convert existing customers and end users to an alternate brand and/or item number and more importantly, at what risk does your company face if your customers and/or end users elect to pursue alternate vendors when you force this changeover upon them. It might be easier, and the risk might be less to consolidate two or more brands of a commodity type item whereas consolidating highly specifiable items might carry a much greater risk and likelihood of business loss. As a final consideration, be sure to poll the end users, your distributor partners, your sales team and your tech support personnel to get their assessment of any brand consolidation proposal so you will have the benefit of their experience and knowledge.

• Six Stages of a Project…Continuous Improvement is a Never-ending Task! Every project can be defined by these six stages of development. Unfortunately, most companies tend to focus on the first three steps…they get the planning done, they get the source gathering accomplished and they produce the product or item and then frequently hand off the project to someone else to address the distribution and/or implementation of the project. And even worse, they spend little or no effort or time to gain feedback or perform any analysis to determine how effective the project was in the first place. We need to remember that Distribution and Implementation at stage 4 is just as important as the