西德克萨斯集装箱(WTC)

为什么要创办西德克萨斯集装箱公司.
In 1978, 在图森开一家板材厂的时候, we learned that traditional box manufacturers had their crystal ball wearing blinders. 有太多错误的决定. 以区分U乐国际的产品和企业信息, U乐国际成功地实施了直销战略. U乐国际在埃尔帕索也会这么做, 1997年，U乐国际推出了西德克萨斯集装箱(WTC), 但伴随着更多的艰辛.

为什么? Local box makers were practicing ‘if things were late, they were worth the wait.’ Yet, we saw an opportunity to prevail with JIT, quality printing and local structural designing.

寻找好员工

It’s no secret that finding able, experienced employees was tough in a small market. 一个小企业主, 谁会避开本地招聘公司,  told me that he preferred to do his own search through networking and local classified ads. 他说:“上帝给了牛奶，我有一桶牛奶.” (Maybe his solution starts with reflective leadership or market based management?)
为了说明, when an existing corporate culture is protected or there is a tight labor market, 考虑, “Five years ago I advertised for an administrative assistant and had more than 30 responses to a four-line ad. The person hired moved on to a better job, and I ran the same ad this year. I only had four responses and there was no way I could 考虑 any of those untrained applicants. 最后, I had to call my ex-employee and hire her back at 20 percent more than her previous salary,” 沮丧的企业家解释道.

招聘直销人员

Sales people are the vital link between the customer and the company. One day, one of my friends, a box maker, noted that he had a revolving door in
一个位置. “不管我对推荐信查得多仔细, 无论我在招聘最佳人选时多么谨慎, 我就是做不好,” 他告诉我. “我雇了, 和三个人一起训练并耐心等待增加的销售额, 在第四次雇佣成功之前. 这是一个非常昂贵的过程.”
他是对的. 销售额低于600万美元的小公司, rarely have the money or the expertise to find the winning salespeople, 客户服务人员和经理.
所以，为了让U乐国际与众不同，我改变了U乐国际的商业模式. 它将把世贸组织带向一个独特的不同方向.

创业风险

U乐国际的目标一直是缓慢增长, 有机, 稳步, 和盈利, 但对表演有着强烈的热情.
计划能否实现?
我猜想，强度决定一切，但并不适合所有人. 由于板材厂适应了当地的宽松服务, 我有意识地决定自力更生.
与此形成鲜明对比的是, 许多浮华的初创企业, 尤其是高科技公司, 相信“大爆炸”模型, 增长非常快, 因为大量的偷猎, 投资和债务. 白手起家的公司靠别人的钱起步很慢. And in their turnaround, you learn a lot about ambiguity in making a pro适合. 这可能意味着成为一个高风险的企业. 在开放U乐国际的35,000平方英尺.ft. 在埃尔帕索的一家板材工厂，我希望它不会孤立，但是
在有限的预算下具有成本效益. 因此, 当我启动时, 而不是把错误看成是我做错了什么, 我关注改进的机会. I wanted to better grasp the degree to which customers were aware of our box business competence. Hopefully, never to outstrip the quality of the goods or services we were providing them.

追求卓越

不幸的是，未来总是悄悄靠近U乐国际. U乐国际不怕竞争对手, 正如U乐国际所相信的，风筝逆风而上, 不跟风一起. But it did mean we had to hire a team that understands and shares goals. 在雇佣了两个新申请人之后, in 2000, 我仍然对他们的创新能力感到矛盾. 他们有一些经验，但不符合我的所有销售标准. As a performance oriented entrepreneur I definitely didn’t  ant to hire someone else’s mistake. Besides, local sales commission was based on sales dollars, which was customary in El Paso.我的计划必须是合适的. 这都是关于基本的职业道德. 这一点通常很难改变. A new salesperson needs an investment of time and money to learn the territory and its accounts. Usually it takes six months to a year to be productive and pay for themselves. 结果?WTC needed $1 million loan from our other plants to escape from the valley of death. A crucial next step was to improve the timeliness of quotes and corrective action by
U乐国际以员工为中心的管理.

新策略-经纪人/代理

聪明的艺术在于知道什么时候该停下来. In California our sales expertise is with broker/agents and 分销商. 诀窍在于了解市场的敏感性.
So, in 2002, our cross-functional team began to compile a list of individuals working for El Paso 分销商, 供应公司和工业销售代表. 然后U乐国际用经纪人的方式说， “如果你感兴趣，告诉U乐国际. 这是U乐国际能提供的. 保持的机会
你创造的大部分利润, but pay us for the business support services and the product with the delivery costs you need.”
U乐国际灵活的薄板厂将提供快速报价, 经纪人在货物上装载标签, 办公空间, 电话, 传真, 复印机, 邮资及互联网接入. We also would provide  commission and inventory reports; on-site design services, free inside sales backup when the salesperson is sick or on vacation; and a secure, 友好的环境.
在一个月内，U乐国际收到了六份回复. Most came from people who had their oars in the water and were anxious to start or had their own small broker business. We had a tough time selecting those we believed would be credit worthy and row our ‘sales’ boat faster.
Even though some candidates were once selling a few packaging products, U乐国际相信他们将不可避免地遭遇挫折. Hiring knowledgeable independent contractors would allow this box maker to build in a small pro适合 for services rendered, 通过提供定制设计, 优质瓦楞纸箱和准时交货. 世贸组织证明使用经纪人是合理的 “because we don’t want to hire people, do a lot of training, and then have them leave. We get them after they’ve been through the weaning process, the educational process,” Chris Widera说.
经纪人/代理商和包装分销商有许多产品线. 他们带来了一项价格竞标业务. Value added products becomea commodity and difficult to sell at higher margin because most sell on price. When we do 300 quotes and receive 30 orders, something is not right. 销售过程对所有参与者来说都是双赢的. Typically in our box making business, the inside salespeople have been order takers. 但从一开始，U乐国际就让他们更积极主动. They now call customers, to inform, build rapport and relationships. You can sense the soul of 西德克萨斯 when speaking to our sales service team. “I think our people like to stay here because we try to make it a fun place to work – for real. U乐国际的人民是忠诚的——他们关心. We involve them in decision-making and the things that affect their job,通用汽车掌舵人尼克•威德拉(Nick Widera)表示.

更新- 15年后

今天, we believe that our best sales growth solution for manufacturing in smaller markets is a combination of selected direct sales by our employees and through loyal broker/agents, 分销商, 加上U乐国际的网站.
事件迫使改变. WTC正以不断的改进来把握未来. 首先，U乐国际搬进了自己的8.5万平方英尺的办公室. 适合. 墨西哥边境附近的一座建筑. +, U乐国际已经升级了每台机器, 每个界面和每个系统都是一个巨大的, 可访问的互联虚拟制造网络, 任何安全智能设备都可以追踪
在世界任何地方打电话.