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Like the green shoots of a well cared for rubber plant!
The outstanding story of William Cook - an antidote for our times!
At a time of extreme and exaggerated gloom about the British and global economies, it is important to be reminded of the business people, who, even in the most unpromising circumstances, remained, and remain, optimistic.
History and our times are populated with outstanding stories of companies that bucked the trend and turned struggling businesses into market leaders.
William Cook Ltd, an ailing, yet well-established family manufacturer of steel castings, rose up from the recession of the late ‘70s to become the market leader in lowest-value segment in the industry.
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On taking over the company at that time, Andrew Cook, as the new MD, went completely against the trend and invested in increased efficiency, quality and capacity, at a time, remember, when output had been falling and capacity was double the volume of industry sales. Rivals thought he was mad! Indeed, conventional thinking would have dictated that Cook milk the business and leave the industry or go into a higher-value and differentiated niche
But Cook’s investment completely transformed the business. Within a few years, sales had risen by 10% against industry losses and by the 1990s Cook’s had become the market leader.
“What did Cook’s do to drive forward a highly effective strategy in difficult times” you ask? Three things basically;
- Achieve greater productivity in key businesses processes
- Concentrate on superior customer driven value and experience using creative strategic thinking skills to achieve breakthroughs
- Build the right organisational environment to create and exploit these strategies.
These 3 things form the focus of our next bulletins. We’ll examine them as we would the green shoots on a well tended rubber plant!
This bulletin is part of our new news service, providing short relevant items that will be of interest to managers and business owners. If you have an enquiry for Andrew Pearson, please click here.
For information on Andrew Pearson, business development programmes, speaking engagements and consultancy assignments click here or call on 01280 844966.
For details of other articles, manuals and books by Andrew Pearson, go to resources at UBS
“If you’re interested in finding out how to make deeper cuts in costs, without destabilising your business, as well as retaining and growing your share of the wallet with some creative strategic thinking in a difficult trading environment, I highly recommend Andrew Pearson’s workshop.” - - Andrew May, Managing Director, Mainland Marketing Ltd, for Isles of Scilly Producers
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