By Katherine Gifford of Moraware
First of all, a huge congrats to Creative Stone for an amazing 25 years being in business! That is no small feat for a small business, especially in this industry.
Of course, we just had to sit down for a chat with Amy Alt-Kellner, co-owner of Creative Stone alongside Dmitri Kellner, to see how they’ve done it.
Figuring out growth
Creative Stone has kept a relatively small team for many years with the help of machinery, technology, and reporting. Like many fabrication shops over the last few years, there was a boom of growth. Amy says they’ve done some hiring but that they’ve also added another CNC machine.
When asked how she knows it’s time to make a change, Amy explains that there is a moment when a business is right on the edge. She says knowing the numbers will help give you the understanding of where that edge is.
Some examples of reports that Amy uses to determine what next steps to make:
- Daily SF produced
- Jobs quoted
- Quotes turned into Orders
- Install time frames
Here’s a great example provided: If you have seven people in the shop fabricating and two machines running, you can produce a certain maximum number of square feet. But what if there is more business knocking at your door and turn around times are starting to get delayed? If you add a machine and keep the same number of employees, how much more square footage could you produce in a day?
This kind of thinking will help you know when it’s time to grow and what sort of changes will help you get there. When in a growth phase, adding anything that lets your employees do more work to meet deadlines is a game-changer.
