Last month, we sent out a survey to all of our sales executives asking for YOUR feedback on the events you plan to attend in 2015. The results are in and we received 47 responses. Of the 47, 14 plan to attend Orlando and 14 plan to attend PPAI in Vegas with a few at each of the other shows. Overwhelmingly, we had 38 of 47 tell us they planned to attend our Proforma Albrecht convention in Orlando in July with another 5 "maybe". So if you have NOT previously completed the survey, you can do it now and stand up and be counted, your opinion matters when it comes to determining which shows and who from our corporate office will attend each show.

September was another record month for us, with over 2.4 Million in sales. As of last week, we have officially broken our record total sales for last year which was just over 21 Million. We are well on our way to breaking the elusive 25 Million dollar goal, but it will clearly take some very hard work over the next 2 ½ months.

 

Here on the "home front" we have had some exciting new "hires" to our Account Executive Team. They are busy getting trained and seasoned - ready to earn a spot on our team as we grow our support staff for today and for the future growth of the company. We are also in the process of making another large investment in our computer system as we increase the speed and our capacity. This will increase the efficiency for our account executives in the hopes of further streamlining the process to get you information sooner than ever before.

 

We are also excited to let you know of some new automation that we have developed. Over the last six months, we began a "trial" and have since expanded our trial to a company wide program. We have taken full control of all freight shipments. This simply means, when a customer has not supplied us with their own freight account number, we are providing our UPS account number to the supplier to drop ship under the Proforma Albrecht Account. This enables us to fully automate and control the tracking for every outbound package in the country. Each morning, UPS downloads a tracking file giving us our tracking information before the office even opens at 8:00 AM. Previously, our account executives would have to manually create files for our "tracking team" to personally call each factory for tracking on individual orders. That is over 120,000 inquiries a year (the average PO has multiple vendors) and in many cases, it would take anywhere between several hours to several days to get tracking information from suppliers. We actually now have that tracking information each morning before the majority of our Suppliers are even open.  

 

In addition, we have automated the process to place that information in our system notes making it immediately available to YOUR account executive. What first started our quest was a call from Rick Tapio, advising that he discovered that Bagmaker's website actually quoted UPS Standard rates with a 20% mark up. He learned that after he asked them for a quote that seemed very high. We checked the specifications against our UPS system and found they had a 20% mark up above PUBLISHED UPS rates.  We did some due diligence and found many suppliers who were also benefiting from a mark up above and beyond the UPS published pricing. While we realize there are always exceptions, we know that the rates we are charging today are true UPS published rates with the added benefit of an immense impact on our efficiency and our ability to provide you with information faster than ever before. On our part, this took a major investment in programming, additional UPS equipment as well as cash flowing the freight costs. (UPS terms are net 7 days, not net 30 like suppliers). We feel the additional investment was worth our ability to provide our employees with a more efficient system and our clients and sales executives quicker access to more accurate data. Just one more way, we continue to provide better, more accurate and efficient service.  

 

Additional automation is now in the works as we invest in more custom programming to provide us with the tools to make it more efficient to send that tracking along to you and to your clients. How does this BENEFIT you and your clients? First, we know that the freight rates are not exceeding UPS published rates. Second, we have tracking information faster than ever before which enables us to catch misguided packages that much sooner as well. It also allows us to KNOW much sooner if a promised ship date was not met, as we do not have to rely on the factory's customer service department to provide the tracking. Last and certainly not least, it frees up our people to do much more productive and proactive work for you. This is just one more way, we are trying to provide that "Amazon Like" experience with the "Personal Emotional Connection" our customers and sales executives have come to "LOVE" about our people

 

 

Get Charged,

 

Fred

 

CHARGED!

 

Now you know the "rest of the story." Here is just a glimpse of the meaning behind the sales numbers. We hope that you can use this knowledge by learning what your peers are accomplishing with different industries, suppliers, products and how those products are being used. The Get Charged column has become the most "talked" about column we have ever written. Help us help you, when you send in orders $5,000.00 or more, let your Account Executive know how your customer is using the product, we will be happy to share the wealth of information. Don't forget, you can find an "archive" of all of the Albrecht Advantage articles by clicking on the "archive" button at the bottom of every edition. If you missed any past articles or just want to recharge for some great ideas, they are all there for your use.

 

Sherry Sklar
continued to break through with another awesome order for her Car Show client with 20,000 collapsible folding bags that will be used to distribute at the auto shows. This great order is being produced by an overseas vendor, Jiangsu Stars International, a Chinese source. The order is worth over $28,000.00. This customer was a result of a lead at an Auto Show Sherry attended 3 years ago. 

John Lucking

 

Curtis Uejo

Cathy Rossner

Diane Schaffer