Just yesterday, I was contacted by a food import/export company to solve a business pain point that they were having. The case presented is simple – the business is facing a decline and they needed some way to revive the business.

I sat down and went through with the business directors and managers on the company’s structure and their product offerings. After understanding the whole environment and the business capabilities, I began to understand a lot of factors that caused the business to face a decline. So I slowly presented my findings as below:

Internal Constraints:

• MOQ issue when ordering
• Unable to clear as much inventory as fast as the company hoped for
• Product margin is slowly decreasing due to the business pressure
• No product value and differentiation
• Unable to tell the end customers “WHY”
• Following trend(s) blindly without understanding
• Unable to change strategy

External Constraints:

• -Decline in the market
• -Fierce competition leading to price wars
• -Local market too reliant on external force(s) to revive

After pointing out these issues and confirming with the directors and managers; I slowly paused and waited for everyone’s attention to focus on me. I continued to offer a solution to the Internal constraints first.

MOQ issue can be easily solved by two factors – time and alternative suppliers.

Time – The company can order a large amount upfront first and negotiate with the supplier on the timing and the amount of the several order releases.

Alternative suppliers – Usually MOQ numbers varies between the suppliers therefore the company will need to source for a supplier that can meet the company’s demand. (Luckily I have gave them a lead in which they can pursue!)

Since the company imports and exports seafood, therefore, a limited amount of time is available to clear the inventory before the seafood expires. I pointed out that the company needs to build more value into their products and to do so I asked the whole room a simple question:

“Besides the price point and packaging, why should the end customer buy your product instead of your competitors?”

Nobody in the room can find an answer.

I gave the directors and managers hint on what values the local market are looking for within a seafood product. I painted a picture in which the company failed to notice that these “Values” are not found within their products. I showed them a way on how to build these values from the ground up and highlighted that these foundational values take time and effort to bring up.

Due to the dropping demand that the company faces, the commercial team had to cut business margins to uphold the business. This is a normal knee jerk reaction but the business shouldn’t do it when they are trying to survive. I explained that prices are not static and therefore can be negotiated.

I told everyone in the room :”There is no value in cutting business margins, if things do keep getting worst then are you going to keep cutting margin until nothing is left?……. instead why not focus on things that build value?”

I looped back to the previous point of value. Explained again how IMPORTANT it is to build value!

The company has suffered a lot from their marketing campaigns and failed to pull in more end customers. These marketing campaigns are well designed that clearly explained WHAT. However, these campaigns failed to highlight “WHY”. One of the company’s ads explained that their seafood are from sustainable sources. Again I asked the marketing team “Why are you doing this?”.

They all answered that it is a trend that other competitors are adopting. I asked again. “WHY are you doing this?”. I was met with a similar reply.

I pointed out that the whole team should highlight the big difference in adopting sustainable source and how the end product is different than non-sustainable source. I explained why following a trend without understanding the context is a waste of time and money.

“Nobody is going to care on WHAT you do but will care on WHY you do it!” I exclaimed.

All and all I summed up on ways of highlighting WHY and how the company can adopt in their next marketing campaign.

After a short break, I resumed with the following point:

“Due to declining external pressure from the industry, this doesn’t mean a company will have to met with the same fate”

I explained how important it is to observe the company’s surroundings during these dire times. To pay close attention to the competitors and react according to the competitor’s actions. I highlighted that this is similar to a game of chinese chess and one should always have “counter moves”. I pinpointed that these “counter moves” should come from the top.

“If you keep on doing a same thing and expecting a different result then I suggest you to stop and think of other ways” I slowly pinpointed. I told the directors that it is their responsibility to make a move and not rely on the lower ranked staff. I explained the situation that if the directors don’t change their ways of doing business then the company might as well rely on luck and see if the business can survive if things gets worse.

“I understand that it’s hard to adopt new ways of thinking but as leaders, we must be constantly thinking. Thinking on new ways and methods. Learning that the world has many colors and understand things that are foundational. The world is constantly changing, markets are non-static therefore your ways of method should follow the same principle!” I explained.

It wasn’t the easiest to deliver the previous statement but the directors and managers NEED to hear this. I explained that this is very crucial because the company is paying them a lot of money but yet met with a not so pleasant result. If things don’t get changed then the market will change the company!

I drafted several milestones in which I expect the company to follow so that they can understand where they are in terms of solving the business pain points and what is needed from each department.

I highlighted that the company should focus on rebuilding themselves from the ground up – starting with building VALUE.

I thank you for reading through this. Remember if your company has a pain point then please feel free to contact me so that we can work together to solve the pain poin!.