I heard somewhere yesterday that companies having less than 100 employees make up the majority of the job market. At one time I had a little over 40 employees and could not sleep at night because I knew that everyday my company had to turn at least 5k or I would go broke, so I switched gears and downsized. I enjoyed being in control of that many people and hated to leave them without a job but, I was afraid.

Has anyone else had similar experiances?

Regards edit

When i first started working at my pervious employer which was a New Residental Community Home Builder we had about 16 emploee's from the top down. Before i worked there they use to be almost 30 people their so they already downsized alot. They wanted more work done out of house subcontracted out then in house. With the slow of the housing marking in the 300k+ homes and only a few communites selling the townhouse style 180k homes they desided to take another cut this time out in the field. It was structured to have 2 field teams each team running 1 townhouse style, 1 300k townies, and then flip flop on single family homes. WIth the complete hault in single familys and a completion of 2 phases of the 300k townies, there was only 2 townhouse style communies left. One that just started and wasn't really doing that well yet and one in the last phase with only 2 9 packs left. There wasn't the need for 2 contruction mang or the need for 4 laborers, so they cut it in half having only one team left. Unforcently thats how the houseing market goes. When things are thriving you need to pump out as many houses as fast as you can to make up for the fall and winter months and slow times. edit

I ran a firm with 311, record sales/profit in 1994-95. When I left there in 2006 there were 95. Most of the firms customers had gone out of business, including several multi billion dollar clients (Fieldcrest/Pillowtex; WestPoint Stevens; Burlington Ind.). My old place closed its doors EOM December 2009. 300,000+ sq. ft. of empty right now. Point being, for me even downsize could not counteract global forces and exodus/loss of clients. I find that the sweet spot for survivability in the industry (my previous) is specialization and 9 employees! My Asia clients on the other hand had median employee count of 400+. edit

Anybody old enough to remember OMNI Magazine? Do you recall the Mensa IQ test published in 1985? I think the test was devised by Ronald Hoeflin, if you nailed it you were an automatic 99.99 percentile super intellect. You mailed the test in along with payment to get the results and your invitation to join Mensa… just another example of my throwing my money away. A friend actually scored very high but swore he "guessed" so it had to be "dumb luck"… which reminds me also, just another example of my having no dumb luck either. I loved OMNI even if it is remembered today for its "giddy futurism" http://www.slate.com/id/2239740/
I could hardly wait to read the articles in this and that other magazine Bob Guccione published ;-) edit

It has been a very rough month for me. It seemed like every virus has come knocking at my door. First the stomach flu, Then a very very hard flu, then what I guess was strep throat. I been so bed ridden this month it isn't funny. I am way behind on projects. Finally Wednesday I felt good enough to come out of my cave into the living room. Grouchy as ever, I informed the family to keep their visitors few and far between. The bugs have been importing into my house left and right. Then my grandson came home from school and started coughing. I asked him what he brought home from school today? The pneumonic plague to finish me off? Ya I was exceedingly grouchy.

So finally I am back to full speed. The cabinet site is put on the backburner till I can get things straight about the content and now working on another project for my brother where we are going to go head on with the SIP industry. This is going to be pure fun. Industrial warfare at it's finest. edit

I like this forum...babble in general is good....we take business too seriously and sometimes this is good. I have a music and life blog that is purely social in nature...fun if I must say. Haha. My babble today is about the snow in the midwest....I know the East Coast got hit hard recently...we've been dealing with it for 2 months now. I am so ready for Spring. What is the first thing that people are looking forward to this Spring? Post on here as this is a cool idea.

Wayne edit

I like this forum...babble in general is good....we take business too seriously and sometimes this is good. I have a music and life blog that is purely social in nature...fun if I must say. Haha. My babble today is about the snow in the midwest....I know the East Coast got hit hard recently...we've been dealing with it for 2 months now. I am so ready for Spring. What is the first thing that people are looking forward to this Spring? Post on here as this is a cool idea.

Wayne edit

Hey Wayne, beautiful family. God has blessed you my friend.
I love how spring smells, and how even though it is only 59 degrees out we open the windows and it is so fresh and wonderful. Every trip in the car is an opportunity to open the sun roof and roll the windows down, and the car washes are jammed. The light, my dear God thank heaven for the light, the longer daylight and the energy it brings. We can all have hope again despite that damn groundhog and his ominous depressing shadow induced grim prediction and yet another seemingly endless winter. Free at last! Thank God almighty we are free at last. Take that OPEC, to hell with your #2 heating oil extortion, hah! We are no longer your hostage timid and shivering at 65 degrees as the furnace groans and our wallets are emptied. I can fire up the patio grill soon and then nothing can come between me and the savory charred flavor of those steaks, burgers or brats as I ignore the nanny nagging of "health experts" extolling the virtues of produce and whole grains. Can the smell of fresh cut grass come soon enough? I think not. Soon all that will be left of winter is the sound of the approaching street sweeper dusting to the curbs the last blackened salty anti-skid embers welcome and familiar in the midst of ice and snow but held in contempt and disgust in the gentle rains of spring. Welcome spring my old friend, welcome.
edit

Oh how I miss spring it somehow bypasses Texas.......... kinda winter then straight to summer...and mosquitos and humidity.... I sure miss the good ole volunteer state.

Regards edit

Spring is here in Missouri and I am busy with quite a few projects.

My brother and I are starting a kitchen cabinet distribution company. Our line of cabinets will hose all the competition here in the U.S. as far as quality and price. Within the next month we will be looking for retail partners. In my experience in the retail business working with distributors a fine lesson I learned is if I was ever on the other side of the fence I would supply my sales line with the proper marketing material. That is what I intend to do here in the near future.

Other things on the burner is working with a sip wall company as well as an Infinite Banking group.

However my role is providing web developing and support. Right now I am playing with some neat tools I picked up. I found a nice little email harvester program and it is a ton of fun. edit

Well its been a while since I posted. Raycore.com and the rtacabinetcompany.com sites are doing ok. My brother Sam does most of the sales support. As far as the later we are looking for retailers/builders/contractors.

I however enjoy doing web design and support. I am also starting up another business http://www.buffalocreekarms.com . Here I will be selling Muzzle loading rifles, pistols and era reenactment equipment. I am going with a 19th Century theme. Muzzle loading was a great hobby I enjoyed in my younger years and I decided to get back into it.

As far as Web Design I think I will stick to specializing ecommerce sites using nopcommerce. I can whip up a template pretty quick and in my own opinion it is one of the best shopping cart systems you can get for free.

So if anyone needs help with an ecommerce site I can shoot a low price.

you can contact me at lefty@pccogs.com . If you just want to chat, that is fine too. edit

On another note I been looking into the Solar energy business using nano technology (thin film)
for my brother Larry (Mr Money). He has been retired for a few years and looking for something to do. I'm having some issues. The company Innovalight will not return my email or phone calls which kind of irks me. edit