Tom Booth - specialist turnaround, business recovery and re-structure.

Retail is detail and if you don't change - eventually the market overcomes you. Retailer skills are generally centred on retailing activity - which is fine unless the business gets into difficulty - especially in the scenareo where continuing Bank support comes into question.

After all; management accounts are just an opinion, cash is King. The differing experience and skillsets required to tune or even fix a business often elude ordinary retailers - where leverage finance, unviable operations, impaired trading coupled with good bank and investor relations are issues with which the average retail expert has little in common.

Retail is detail - we all know that but with so much detail comes plenty of risk. With all these plates to keep spinning, what do you do when one starts to fall off? A business well run, even in good times is susceptible to the smallest change when operating on low returns on sales. Often, a 4% fall in sales, in a 2% ROS business, all things being equal - leads to a complete wipe out of PBT; resulting in cash burn and concern from investors. If accounts are only presented outside the business annually or at best half yearly - this can represent a shock to investors. Investors don't like shocks or surprises - a couple of such incedents, even on a small scale - can lead to a loss or lack of confidence in management on the part of it's sponsors. Once that happens - you could lose control of your own business.

Small market forces are enough to take the whole business off the rails.The trouble is, that once de-railed, the business ploughs on in a straight line.

It's often not the case that you don't know what's gone wrong or even what's needed to put things right - actually, it's just that familiarity can be your worst enemy and none of your team will wish to own up to a problem until it's too late and out of control..

Couple all that with the vast array of performance indicators in retail. Which dial do you take notice of ? Which adjustment do you make first ? How do you know what are Key indicators and what are pure red herrings ?

There are only two real levers to control your business- revenue to pull upwards and cost to push down but then what's good cost and what's bad and how do we get more of our share of business? Isn't it strange how easy it is to increase cost and investment in support of more and more profit - compared to how hard it is to get it all out again - especially if it's so late in the day that your bank is unwilling to cover a bigger overdraft?

Have you considered what if scenareos around your business? What if sales fell 10% or margins dropped 10% or both? What is certain key players left tomorrow? What performance/people elements are mission critical? Where's the upside? Who have you got on the team who can go up a gear? Where should you focus your efforts to gain the biggest bang for the Buck? Every business is different, so where do you start? Even knowing the answers is not enough - immaculate implementation of a change or recovery plan is vital. If you get into trouble - it's all about ation and communication - for optimal results and so as to not scare the horses. This is an expert field where experience of change management and business recovery, together with practice make all the difference.

Case history's - from actual living examples of household names;

Lookers, Perrys, Polar, RBS, Stirling Investments , Endless LLP , Interim Partners, Black Horse , Brownhills

There is another way. A better way. A way that leaves you to address the business needs whilst knowing that your company has a plan around affordability in the cost base and a robust, well thought out marketing plan.

There could be a hundred, even two hundred fixes to your business today. We are proficient at identifying where you can focus on the biggest bang for the buck.

We specialise in turning the irrelevant many into the vital few.

Check out our hints and tips here, including business recovery tactics

We can help you. Fast.

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