Marc Gardner’s biggest complaint about
his business is that it’s growing so quickly
that it’s hard for him to secure enough
office space.
With a background in credit card processing, Gardner founded North American
Bancard Inc. in 1992, centering his business
model on small businesses that have few
locations processing credit card transactions. Because they were small, they were of
little value to larger credit card processing
companies, and Gardner knew he could
succeed by focusing on smaller customers,
providing them with a level of service and
support they weren’t finding from his competitors.
Eleven years later, he had 30 employees
and a portfolio of 15,000 merchant
accounts, but the business was faltering as
Gardner terminated the company’s relationship with his processing partner, and the
business faced escalating losses and growing costs. But instead of giving up, he
refined his strategic model, centering it on
people, customer care and technology, and
positioned his company for growth.
His first goal was to hire the best and brightest people from inside the industry and make
sure they stayed. Second, he focused on building business relationships with customers
and making sure they received the best possible customer care. And third, he focused on
regularly integrating new technology into his
company to remain competitive.
All of his efforts have succeeded in creating a fast-growing company. North
American Bancard is the 32nd largest merchant acquirer in the U.S. and from 2005 to
2007, revenue increased 108 percent, while
the number of employees grew by 61 percent over the same period.
HOW TO REACH: North American Bancard, www.nabancard.com
or (248) 269-6000