Learn from your failures
One of the final steps in the turnaround at Industrial Transport
was when the company purchased a majority interest in
Innogistics LLC in 2005. The purchase was able to be made
through a restructuring of its debt, cost reductions — which
included a cut in salaries of the owners — and some personal capital infusion.
“Part of our strategy and vision of where we were going was we
would now be able to serve our original Industrial Transport customers in another line of business,” Hall says. “We had to obviously
announce we were in this business, visit and do presentations about
the new business. We not only deepened the view of our sales from
our customers, they also saw us strategically lined up with one of the
leaders in the industry.”
In purchasing Innogistics, Hall made the decision not to merge
the companies together.
“They are separate entities jointly managed by me and they have
individual operating and sales efforts and financial accountability,”
Hall says. “It’s accomplished what we want because it creates a
stronger image in the marketplace of the benefit of the relationship between the two companies.”
When the company set out to find a business to fill the slot that
Innogistics eventually did, its failures along the way ended up leading to final victory.
“There were several options of how to do it, and we tried some
that didn’t work,” Hall says. “We were finally fortunate to have this
relationship opportunity come to fruition. In part, it was our pursuit of this type of business that made others aware of what we
were looking for. Someone contacted us and said, ‘We know what
you’re trying to do and here’s an opportunity.”
At the end of the day, it’s all about getting the information in front
of you and making decisions based on what the information
shows.
“You’ll still make some bad decisions, but it will be better with
good information,” Hall says. “We have undergone and continue to
undergo a process of trying to bring in more talent and better talent and knowledge to not only gather the information but to use it
at the lowest point in the organization possible.”
HOW TO REACH: Industrial Transport Inc., (216) 881-5052 or www.industrialtransport.com
