Plating is Golden

Sales shine as chief named Entrepreneur of Year

Columbia City- C&R Barrel Plating had two customers when Daryl Lambert bought the corrosion- protection business in 1968. Lambert quickly made changes. In order for pieces to be coated individually as well as in groups tumbling in barrels, Lambert added rack plating to the business, although he didn’t drop “Barrel from the company’s name years. “I had four-man operation there at the end of the first week,” Lambert said.

Lambert expanded the mental plating business four times over the years, including moving from original site, which formerly housed a dry cleaner. The company now has 202 customers, two nearly identical plants across the street form its first digs and 120 employees working weekends to keep up. “We need about 130, but we can’t get them,” Lambert said, citing Whitley Country’s low unemployment rate, which was 2.4 percent in June and 2.8 percent in July.

“We turning down business all the time,” he added.

Last month, Lambert was named “Entrepreneur of Year” by management consultant George S. May International Co., which chose his from more than 10,000 companies it counseled in 1996. George S. May International Co. was called in to prepare C&R Plating for QS 9000 certification and improve management as 65-year-old Lambert slows down Lambert remains chief executive of the company, but Dennis Blaugh was named president a year ago. Blaugh started at C&R as a high school senior a few months after Lambert purchased the business. C&R Plating, owned by Lambert and his wife, Eloise, also was named the top Hoosier pollution-prevention company by the Indiana Industrial Operator Association earlier this year.

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SH Firm implements standards of quality management system
By Mary Wright

South Haven- A quality management system that was implemented at a city business this summer has already produced what one company official describes as “remarkable strides” in implementing the system’s standards and guidelines. Double J Molding, a second-tier (sells to an auto industry supplier, which in turn sells their products to companies like Ford, GM and Chrysler) company that makes injection-molded plastics parts for the automotive and other industries, initiated its QS 9000 quality management system in July of this year, with the assistance of consultants from the George S. May International Company of Park Ridge, Illinois.

QS 9000 is an expanded version of a quality management system developed in Europe called ISO 9000, which the American auto industry began using in 1987. under the QS 9000 system, companies adopting its 84 business standards, or sub- elements, can apply for certification by a third- party registrar. Once a company’s policies and procedures meet the system’s requirements and it is certified by a registrar, the QS 9000 certification can be placed on company’s letterhead and building to indicate that it is a business that adheres to a rigorous quality standard.

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Our Mission

To become the leading provider of quality contract services for the State of Alaska

Our History

M. C. Corporation (Morning Calm Corporation) focuses on the enhancement of small
businesses in the State of Alaska. Its mission is to provide “Quality Services through
Excellence”. MCC’s business strategy is to identify niche business opportunities and
embellish its market potential through methodical innovations in its processes. During
the last eight years, MCC has developed businesses in contract and retail services.
MC Corporation was formed on December 9th, 1991 by a group of minority residents in
Anchorage, Alaska. At the time of incorporation, MC Corporation (MCC) provided
cleaning services on-post for the quarters at Ft. Richardson, the local US Army base,
and professional office buildings in Anchorage. Upon receiving 8(a) status in February
1994, MC pursued various 8(a) set-aside contracts with the Federal Government in its
respective fields.

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Bob Fram

President, Garden & Valley Isle Seafood

Bob Fram began distributing seafood out of the trunk of his car in the early ’80 to any restaurant in Hawaii that would open its kitchen door from him. It helped that he had farm-raised Kauai blue prawns in his trunk. The oversized bright-blue shellfish opened a lot of doors early on, says Fram. As business picked up, he eventually persuaded his childhood friend, Dave Marabella, to join him in Honolulu, and the duo founded Garden & Valley Isle Seafood in 1984 as a seafood distributor. Fram is president/ secretary and Marabella is vice president/ treasurer.

The company has since grown to shipping fresh seafood to restaurants and wholesaler worldwide and boasts sales in excess of $15 million. Seafood is processed and shipped a 10,000-square-foot plant in Honolulu and a 7,000-square-foot facility on Maui, both of which have state-of-the-art food-production equipment. The distributor employs 45 and offers product from Hawaii, Japan, Tahiti, Fiji, Costa Rica, Chile, the Pacific Rim and Canada.

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East Penn Canada

News Surge – Message from the President

I am very excited about our prospects for a new fiscal year. We anticipate our rapid growth to continue and as a result we have hired George S. May, an international consulting firm, to review our corporate structure and recommend changes we should make in order to position ourselves to strategically handle future growth. Some of you may remember that we engaged this same consulting firm about 10 years ago and that their recommendations were instrumental in taking us from a $20 million company to a $75 million company. Their objective this time is to help us organize ourselves so that we can quickly, efficiently and profitably grow into a $120 million dollar company.

I would like to emphasize that our company right now is very profitable and that we are not experiencing any significant problems at this time, financial or otherwise. It’s because we are doing so well that we can afford to hire George S. May and be proactive about ensuring a bright and positive future for the company and all its employees.

The entire management team at head office is very excited at this timely opportunity to turn East Penn Canada from a good company into a great company. Our goal is to make East Penn Canada one of the best companies to work for in all of Canada.

I will keep you posted as this project moves forward.

Obtaining Operating Information: Crucial For Effective Management

Operating a small business requires a mix of skills and knowledge. However, “control” is the one essential ability that every small business owner requires. Control means the ability to quickly and accurately determine the condition of the business. To often owners is think this means involvement in everything. This is wrong. A major fault of many owners is trying to do too much-wearing too many hats. While many entrepreneurs are experts in their specific business activity, they are often overwhelmed by the reality of the day-to-day operations. Instead of focusing on basic business practices, too many get caught up in the minutia and lose their dreams. The solution is to adopt systems and procedures that provide the essential information about the operation. With efficient systems feeding information, the owner can effectively manage. Without these systems, small business owners will forever feel like there are never enough hours in a day. The owner senses that the business has become a monster- it runs the owner running the business. Efficiently tracking key measures of a business allows a tremendous amount of control that continually surprises many owners.

The Smell of Leather – The History of Rochester Shoe Stores

With things going along so good most owners would leave ‘well enough alone.’ Not Jack Rubenstein though. With an eye to the future he was unsure if he knew what steps to take to assure the continued success and growth of the business. His team of confidants – his lawyer, accountant, and friends – suggested that he talk to a professional consulting firm to analyze his business.

Whenever Jack decided to do something he usually did it first class. He was true to form when he met with Mr. White, a representative of the George S. May Consulting Company. Mr. White explained that his company was international in scope, providing clients with proven business methods for cutting waste, reducing costs, and increasing profits.

Jack said, “Didn’t you leave something out? How about doing more business?”

White said, “Of course.”

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William Fisk Harrah – The Life and Times of A Gambling Magnate

“We grew just as businesses that start with six employees and get to thousands.”

“But on the management end, we still tried to operate the old way and we knew we were spinnin’ our wheels.” It could very well have been Maurice Sheppard’s Daily Report that triggered the notion of rationalizing management: at any rate it was becoming clear that something had to be done if Harrah’s were to be run in Harrah style. There was a problem with that – Harrah didn’t know how to do it. So he did what was coming to be instinctive: “I think I read about the George S. May Company in TIME. They were called ‘business engineers.’
“So we got in touch with them. They came in and they really turned us around. I mean – we were doing so many things just like a bunch of little kids. It’s just what evolved, just hit-and-miss.

“Our chain of command and our management chart – we were just terrible.” Certainly by the time of the business study, Harrah’s was committed to the idea of bringing in consultants on most major decisions. It is Maurice Sheppard’s view that these consultants served a dual purpose. The substance of their reports was important, of course. But they were also there to make recommendations reinforcing decisions that Bill Harrah had already made. In many cases this entailed acting as Cassandra, for surely if there was one part of his job that Harrah hated, it was being the bearer of bad tidings.

“We must have had four or five or six or eight (consultants). We’ve learned (that) every two, three, four years (they) should come in and take a look. “They’re super, and that’s why we are as efficient as we are. We get credit for being very efficient and our accounting system and all that, which, of course, is our doing. But the incentive came from these concerns, these business specialists.”

Introduction
QuickBooks from Intuit Corporation is the most widely used business accounting and management software by small and mid-size businesses. Since its introduction, QuickBooks has increased in popularity. However, the usefulness of QuickBooks depends on one key element – the accuracy of the information that the user inputs. Many small and mid-size business, which are the primary users of QuickBooks, are not getting full value from their investment of money and time because of data input errors. In accurate information in QuickBooks results in inaccurate reports being generated by QuickBooks. These bad reports can result in poor management decisions.

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