A few lessons from the road
Marathon Industries discusses goals and milestones from perspective of a Santa Clarita Valley entrepreneur
Ed. Note: The Signal reached out to local entrepreneurs to share their stories, challenges and triumphs with the rest of the business community. For more on entrepreneurs and local resources, check out this month’s Business Journal at SignalSCV.com.
This week, we asked Chad Hess, president of local company Marathon Industries, about his company’s goals, and his keys for being successful at the one-year, five-year and 10year mark.
Marathon Industries’ main business is the manufacture, assembly, installation and repair of truck bodies, trailers and transportation equipment, according to the company’s website.
Year 1
We purchased the assets of an existing truck equipment manufacturing company in 1993.
Our goals were to maintain our customer base and earn back the goodwill that diminished as our predecessor was declining.
Managing cash flow and supporting employees were also key concerns.
Year 5
We were fortunate to grow our business close to 20 percent annually during our first five years.
To this day, it takes a lot of hands on management to operate our business successfully. Our growth in sales was paralleled by the need to grow our personnel.
We are always conservative when it comes to adding to our team because payroll costs and the related expenses are a very large part of our overall expenditures.
Year 10
Continuous improvement. We strive to be the easiest company to do business with in our industry. We have been able to create policies and procedures to help maintain our quality, lead times, and customer support.
By our 10th year, we had built an infrastructure that provided stability, however we never lost our desire to maintain the flexibility and responsiveness of a smaller company. We maintain that goal to this day.