As you probably noticed my “words of wisdom” have not been appearing in the last few months. Truth is, I ran out of stuff to write about. My very kind editors agreed that I could/should take a sabbatical and come back when the creative juices started flowing again. It’s hard to believe, but I have been writing in Pet Age for 10 years.

As you faithful readers know, most of my articles come out of what happens in my business, and/or how I screwed something up (a.k.a., what I have learned). My favorite ones are when I get really ticked off at a vendor. So over the past few months life at Dave’s has been pretty smooth. Our stores are doing well, and the wholesale business is still growing at great clip. I have gone to several conferences where I have picked up very useful marketing info, and I followed some advice that was given to me.

That advice is worth retelling and certainly worth you remembering if you plan on growing your business. Here it is: If you are running a business that does X volume and you want to double or triple the size of the business, hire a person who can run the bigger business.

Seems like such a “duh” doesn’t it? Trouble is most of us don’t do it. Why don’t we? Well, you may have to pay too much for a presently overqualified person or we don’t even know what the job will be when we get to that level or whatever other reason you can think of. I can tell you, if you hire the most overqualified folks you can find, they will help you grow your business.

On a different note, one of my favorite sayings in the retail world is “if you don’t want your customers to spend any more money with you, don’t show them anything new.” Think about it for a minute. Makes sense, doesn’t it? So one of the questions is how and where do you find new stuff to show your customers?

I am such a lucky guy, I get to visit so many stores across the country, and I really do find at least one new product or merchandising tip on every road trip. My phone is loaded with pics of brands and products that we don’t carry in our stores (yet). Not to mention ways to merchandize.

So where am I going with this? You have get out of your store.

It amazes me how many store owners don’t visit competition and stores in other areas to see what they are missing. I don’t care how good a merchant you are, you just can’t learn new things if you don’t get out and see the world. I also ask my distributor reps what other stores are doing that I am not. My reps know my first question is, “What are we doing wrong?” The interesting thing is my reps are not the least bit bashful. They tell me the good, the bad and the ugly.

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I ask these questions because in the last few weeks I have been fortunate enough to be with some folks who are now, or becoming, real leaders. I was visiting one of my good friends who has a very successful store.

As is usually the case with owner/operators, ever since I have known him he has been involved with just about every decision that was made in the company. Making deals, the marketing, product selection, you name it, he was there to make the decision.

Mind you, he was making very good decisions and his flourishing business was proof. Then something happened that made him realize he has good people and they should help run the business.

I was there to pitch some new skus of food and much to my delight, Joe was not in the room. He told me he knows the only way to let his folks grow is to let them make the decisions. He is certainly there if they need him but, “they can handle it.”

I gotta tell you, I was just so impressed with the way things were handled. I could see some coaching, which was completely appropriate since we all need to be guided a little, but the decision to bring in the line, or not, were made by the folks who actually would have to sell them.

What a concept!

More importantly, the style of leadership was evident. It is a: “I will coach you, you are a bright person, and I have faith in your abilities. You know my vision for the business, take it and run, I am here if you need me.”

Here is the part I like the best: “You make the decisions, I won’t second guess you.”

Now, we obviously can’t turn over decision making to folks who aren’t qualified, but have you given your employees the chance to show you they are qualified?

I don’t want you to confuse being a good boss with being a good leader. There are differences.

A good boss is fair, honest, knows and practices good management skills, and is a good human being. A leader takes those skills, and is able to get folks to “buy into” whatever he/she is “selling.” We all know great leaders and we also know some amazingly powerful leaders that were anything but good.

One of my good friends took over his folks very small food, people, not pet, service distribution business a few years after he got out of college. Over the course of many years, he built the business up to a pretty big business and sold it to a national company for a large chunk of change.

He is a leader.

He oozes passion for whatever he is doing and his can’t fail manner and personality is contagious. You just can’t help feeling energized being with him.

We were together last week at meeting listening to a presentation. The presenter was talking about an investment idea that made perfect sense, everything was upfront and clear. But the presenter just didn’t do a good job presenting his plan. He was a great guy, as honest as can be, bright, knows his stuff but just not a good presenter.

My buddy said something to me that just hit such a chord with me: “You need rapport before you can influence.” So simple but profound.

All great leaders build the rapport before they try to influence. Think about that, do you do that in your management life? Actually, it is true in your personal life as well. We in the group are waiting to see if he sends a note thanking us for our time.

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She was telling me about the competition moving near her, voicing her concern about all the consolidation in the industry and just talking shop in general. She said business was OK but she has a huge opportunity with her wholesale business. Not being one to mind his own business, when I enquired about the wholesale business and why she wasn’t going “full steam” ahead with that she explained all the things going on in the retail store. Believe me, I get it. Been there, done that, in fact, still doing that.

So one of the things that was taking up so much of her time is a big event they do at the store every year. The event is huge and very important. However, when she told me this was the 7th year they have done the event, I stopped her from talking. It was kind of funny. I looked at her, she looked at me and said, “you’re right.” I hadn’t even said anything yet. Are you guessing where this is going?
Finally, I asked, why can’t somebody else put the event together? It’s not as if you haven’t done it before. I don’t care if you hire an event planner to take care of the details, get somebody else to do the grunt work so you can build your business.

Doesn’t this just hit home? How many hours do we spend doing the day-to-day, minute-by-minute “firechiefing” instead of the real job, which is to grow the business? I don’t care how big or small your organization is, don’t get lost in the minutia of putting out fires all day long.

In this particular instance, it seems to me the opportunity to do what she was working on would probably end up being a bigger business than her retail store. For me, the best part is to see the light go off in her head, to see the sudden energized look on her face and to hear the, ‘I am calling them first thing Monday morning.”

I am so fortunate to get to know folks in all kinds and sizes of businesses. To be honest, I have met some owners who I just can’t figure out how they are still in business. They are easy to spot. You know some of them. They all have one word in common that would describe them, and that word is, negative. Luckily for me, I meet and am friends with way more folks that I learn things from every time I am with them.

I have mentioned him before, but this guy is just amazing. His mind never stops thinking of new ways to grow his business. Russ is one of those guys that attends every seminar he can, sucks up knowledge like a sponge and is the most humble guy in the world. Oh by the way, he runs a very successful business.

So my kid, Doug, is a musician. He wrote and recorded a great song, “I’d rather be with dogs than be with you.” He contacted a couple of shelters we work with and put the word out on Facebook to send in pictures of your dog to be in the video that goes with the song. Check it out at www.youtube/dougratner/dogs.
I sent the link to the video to a bunch of my friends, I know I am Doug’s dad, but it’s a great video. I knew this would happen. I get an email back from Russ telling me what a brilliant song/video and naturally, Doug must have been adopted. Surely he didn’t come from my genes. Anyway, in the “of course he would think of this,” he says, “can I have Doug’s permission to send the song to my customers. They will love it.”

I read that and just shook my head. Isn’t that just Russ, completely focused on what would make his customers happy. I wish I could bottle his enthusiasm, smarts, and creativity and sprinkle it on some of the retailers I know.

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SPRINGFIELD — Dave Ratner read aloud from a customer email detailing a bad experience at Dave’s Soda & Pet City.

It drove him nuts. And that’s why he’s in the Hall of Fame.

“You need to give the customer a reason to do business with you,” Ratner said “If I can build a brand that says you love Dave’s , hopefully you will feel too guilty to shop somewhere else.”

Ratner was recently inducted into the Retailers Association of Massachusetts Hall of Fame as both a reflection of Dave’s Soda & Pet City and his efforts lobbying on behalf of retailers at the state and national levels.

Ratner founded Dave’s Soda City in Springfield in 1975. About a year later, he noticed all the pet food stocked in supermarkets and he started to branch out. Today, he’s got seven stores, including a new pet-only store in Ludlow and 150 employees.

Lately his federal lobbying has focused on building support for the federal Internet Sales Tax Bill that would force retailers to charge sales tax on purchases made over the web. The bill, which Ratner and other brick-and-mortar retailers support, has passed the U.S. Senate but faces strong opposition in the U.S. House of Representatives.

“I’m at an immediate d 6.25 percent disadvantage to everybody else,” Ratner said. “Amazon, Petmeds.”

Of course, it isn’t realistic for someone to order a bag of dog food online. But his soda business is branching out to gourmet sodas sold online. And the lure of the Internet does draw customers for bigger-ticket pet items.

“You see it every day. People come in and look at all the aquarium filters. They can even scan the bar codes into their smart phones and find the exact same thing online,” Ratner said.

Service, friendly in-person service, is one way to compete.

Everyone who works for Ratner has to sign a paper saying their No. 1 responsibility is to give the customer a positive experience.

“It’s got everything to do with my employees,” he said. “If I have jerks working for me. I’m in big trouble.”

It also makes recruiting and retention a big priority.

“We have to go through a lot of pits to find that cherry,” Ratner said.

Article Featured in MassLive: http://www.masslive.com/business-news/index.ssf/2013/06/dave_ratner_of_soda_pet_city_fame_gets_i.html

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