Category Archives: General Business Advice

Build a Business with Relationships

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No one likes to feel hustled while shopping, whether it’s in a retail store or trade show booth.

To attract customers without brazen hawking or downright pushiness, businesses need to refine the art of the soft sell. That begins by making the store or trade show booth an intentional destination for people who are truly interested in what the business sells.

Create relationships

While any business would like to sell at least one product to every person who walks in the door, that’s the type of unrealistic goal that can turn sales reps into apex predators.

A long-term perspective toward potential customers focuses on developing a relationship that lasts longer than one transaction. It lays a foundation through attraction rather than persuasion. Continue reading →

Manufacturing Make-Over Reaps Rewards for Albuquerque Business

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C. Aaron Velasquez knew it was time to modernize the equipment and processes his family’s metal-plating business had used for four decades, but he wasn’t sure where to start.

An industry contact introduced him to New Mexico Manufacturing Extension Partnership (NM MEP), a nonprofit that trains manufacturers in lean principles, value-stream mapping and other methodologies that help businesses increase profitability and competitiveness.

Theta Plate, a second-generation, family-owned Albuquerque-based business, specializes in electroplating of precious metals for industrial and commercial uses, such as friction reduction and conductivity enhancement in electrical and computer components and applications that improve the radiance of costume jewelry. Continue reading →

NM FAST Program Propels Anti-Counterfeit Entrepreneur

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Roy Montibon worked with the New Mexico FAST program. Article by Jason Gibbs.

Heritage. Honesty. Respect for tradition.

These are keys to Roy Montibon’s work as CEO of Montibon Provenance International Inc. His mission to ensure the authenticity of Native American art has drawn support from New Mexico State University’s Arrowhead Center, the Small Business Administration, and the respect of collectors and artists alike.

In 2017, Montibon tapped into resources offered by the New Mexico Federal and State Technology Partnership (NM FAST) program to develop a system to prevent counterfeit merchandise from polluting the Native American art market. Shoddy knock-off merchandise not only devalues the market, but it devalues the work that honest artists produce and harms the overall market, he said.

“The financial impact is three-fold,” said Montibon. “Collectors are ripped off. Native artists are deprived of revenue from sales of work that is falsely attributed to them. And, because the fake work is of poor quality compared to authentic work, the perceived value of the artist’s work is diminished in the marketplace, which also has a detrimental effect on future generations who may be considering a career in the arts.” Continue reading →

Value Proposition is First Step Toward Market Success

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To stand out in a market saturated with consumer products and get the attention of consumers deluged with advertising appeals, an entrepreneur needs to offer a product or service with obvious benefits and unquestionable superiority over the competition.

That isn’t as easy as it sounds. The history of U.S. commerce is littered with countless products whose inventors misjudged the market’s appetite or need.

Getting a product or service to market begins with a value proposition: a sober evaluation of who the product is for, what need it will fulfill, what dissatisfies consumers about the products currently being used to fulfill that need and how the new product is a marked improvement. Continue reading →

New Perspective Can Jump-Start a Business

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Business leaders are a hardy breed, loath to admit trouble and express anything but optimism and confidence. This tough façade is handy when applying for loans, seeking investment capital and competing in the rough and tumble marketplace.

But it’s hard to maintain when customers are drifting away, employees are quitting, cash flow is falling short and a new product is taking too long to reach market. It’s hard to stay externally cool when internal fears wear down nerves and mental stability.

As tempting as it might be to turn inward and work even harder at such times, experts suggest a healthier approach is for the business owner to create some distance between her personal and professional lives. Continue reading →

Distributors Expand Market for New Mexico Companies

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Owners of The Bitter End found that distributors could increase revenue. Article by Sandy Nelson.

Bill York started making his own bitters nine years ago while bartending at a Santa Fe cigar bar, where he learned the alchemy of sophisticated cocktails. His small company, The Bitter End, now manufactures its distinctive handcrafted bitters at a Santa Fe facility and reaches consumers through distributors in New York, California, Chicago and Europe.

“This wasn’t the beginning of the craft cocktail movement,” York said, “but there weren’t that many bitters makers on the market, and when I got the idea for spicy, concentrated bitters, it seemed like a good idea to give it a go.”

York developed his initial five recipes while learning how to navigate the bureaucracy of marketing a food product. New Mexico requires alcoholic beverages to be marketed through a distributor, but mixers — classified as alcohol flavorings — are treated as food products.

“I set up a website to accept sales and started sending out samples to prominent bartenders and influencers,” he said. “We visited a lot of bars and gave out a lot of samples; we tweeted like crazy. We went to Tales of the Cocktail [the world’s largest cocktail trade show, which happens every July in New Orleans] and set up a booth to meet people and sell bottles.” Continue reading →

Cash Flow: WESST Workshop Teaches Business Essentials

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Julianna Silva is Managing Director of the WESST Enterprise Center. Article by Sandy Nelson.

Keeping track of the money flowing in and out of a business is challenging even in the best of times — when cash is flooding in and the outflow is a comparative trickle. But any business that wants to stay in business needs to master cash flow management.

To help small-business owners get a handle on this essential skill, WESST in Albuquerque is conducting a workshop, “Learn the Language of Your Business Finances,” that includes demonstrations of how businesses can manage their finances, including cash flow, by having participants work with a spreadsheet for a fictitious venture.

The exercise gives tangible examples of the costs that businesses can expect to pay —advertising, supplies, raw materials, loan payments, payroll, rent, insurance premiums, and so on — and the revenue they can anticipate for a given period. The hypothetical example shows trouble looming as bills come due and the revenue falls short of what’s needed to meet obligations. Continue reading →

Small Size No Deterrent for Nonprofit Lender DreamSpring

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Charles Riley obtained a DreamSpring loan for his “solarlite” business. Article by Roger Makin.

Entrepreneurs come in all shapes and sizes, but they all share a love of what they do and the desire to further their endeavors.

For Charles Riley of Carrizozo, entrepreneurship began at an early age. He built his first house at age 21 on land donated by his parents. It was at that time he also started building and selling furniture as a hobby.

While serving as a firefighter in Stratford, Connecticut, Riley simultaneously worked a full-time construction job. As he put it, “I loved the job as a firefighter, but it also had very flexible hours.”

At one point he owned an art gallery in Sun Valley, Idaho. But Riley’s path eventually led him to Carrizozo, New Mexico, where he offered to build a house for his daughter. The construction project became his when his daughter decided to move back to Vermont. Riley finished the house, moved in and stayed. Continue reading →

Following the Signs to Small Business Success

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Virtually everyone in New Mexico has seen signs made by P&M Signs. Article by Jason Gibbs.

You’ve seen the signs.

For nearly half a century, Phil Archuletta, the CEO of P&M Signs, has crafted signs for the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management. He got his start in 1970 in Ojo Caliente before opening P&M Signs in Mountainair in 1991. He now employs a dozen people in the rural community in Central New Mexico.

If you’ve toured a national forest, Archuletta’s signs likely guided your way. If you’ve seen the ubiquitous Smokey Bear fire danger signs in New Mexico, that’s his handiwork. Stopped to read a historical marker in the state? Yup, that’s his too.

The signs are produced in an 11,000 square-foot, $1 million facility in Mountainair. He’s designed and manufactured Forest Service road signs all over the country, “coast to coast,” he said. Around 70 percent of the signs in New Mexico are churned out of the giant, blue building in Mountainair with “lots of cars parked around it,” Archuletta said. He also holds a patent for the road closure signs used in the national forest and BLM lands. Continue reading →

I, CoBot — Automation Offers Opportunities for NM Businesses and Workers

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Build With Robots participated in Mfg Day NM in 2018. Article by Claudia Infante, NM MEP; Photo by Jane Phillips

The way they see it at Albuquerque’s Build With Robots LLC (BWR), automation and human labor can exist side by side, even in small and medium-sized businesses, without the dystopian consequences imagined by many futurists and science fiction writers.

The New Mexico company works with manufacturers and other businesses to enhance their productivity and competitive advantage by incorporating “collaborative robots,” or CoBots, into the labor force to perform the more monotonous tasks so people can work where they are most valuable.

“Fill seasonal demand or vacancies,” BWR suggests on its website. “Off-load dangerous or dirty jobs. Free up your team to do more rewarding and higher-value work.” CoBots, the company stresses, augment rather than replace human resources. Continue reading →