Today was a different sort of day for me. I got the opportunity to meet with the owners of two reputable companies in the Philadelphia area. I usually keep anything work related out of this blog because I think that a personal blog and a business are two separate entities that shouldn’t be mixed. However I think that some people who read this blog don’t get this opportunity so I’ll share it with you.

The first business owner grew his business into a multi-million dollar company through hard work and knowledge of the industry in just 10 years. He was a smart guy who worked the trade for his entire life and understands the needs of the contractor. People like dealing with him and it was a good example of personalizing the business relationship. For me it was also a business opportunity to try to get our product onto their shelves. Visits like this expand my mind on how to look at certain situations. A great way to grow as a person is to copy someone who you deem successful. The organization of the company was also impressive. Everything was very neat, clean and presented appropriately. He also gave some good tips for advertising on the radio.

The second business we looked at was on a much larger scale. The building of this business was 400,000sq ft and it employed 250 people. The company makes ducts for air circulation out of galvanized sheet The first thing I noticed was that it was union labor and the rules that they operated under. We went right before lunch time and when the bell rang, everyone stopped what they were doing and had lunch. There is a structure to union labor to create a fair and honest way of work (as long as everyone works). This company had equipment everywhere, stacks and stacks of coiled galvanized, people using all sorts of machinery. I’ve never seen anything like it before in my life. It was a real impressive display of relatively big business. To be in charge of that many people seems so overwhelming that I’m not sure where I’d begin. Being the owner of a company that has expenses like that with payroll, inventory, machinery and the whole nine yards is such a daunting task that I get the feeling that you just grow into it. It was a great experience though.

After seeing that, I related the two companies we saw to our own company and there is a ways to go. To grow a business might sound simple in theory but there is tons of hard work put into making something successful. If it was easy everyone would do it. It’s why most people work for other people. I still think though that you have to see how other people do it before you try to do it yourself. Experience is a huge factor to being successful. Knowing how to make good decisions comes from experience and the better decisions you makes, the better off you’ll be. I thought that some people might be interested in this entry and make it this far. If not, then they will never have read this sentence. But you did.