Connections - September 2009 - 15
mistakes were being made for quite some time but my family had reached the point where they could no longer move forward with the market. It simply wasn’t viable. My family announced the market was closing. “There was a united gasp, then quiet, a quiet that I can still feel,” Mom said. She had faithfully served for years as the treasurer and secretary. The stunned merchants sat there before cold panic set in. Mom looked over at Pop. She saw him wipe away a tear before he left to head down toward his office. My family recognized the vendors made a lot of sacrifices to create this market. When the business toppled, everyone was badly torn because they had a lot of skin in the game, so to speak. During the next few weeks, the vendors gutted the place and hocked their belongings to cover their own debts. My family watched the vendors pack up and leave. The pervasive feeling of, “Now what—what about the merchants, their goods, their livelihood?” seeped through all of us. Then came the blame. Was it the economy, the location, or the customers? In the end however, my family blamed themselves. That was 12 years ago, but situations like this are playing out once again. They fit the pattern that many businesses fall into today—like not being able to collect money that’s owed to them, and the need for a new sales tactic—which leads to an abysmal cash flow situation and subsequent failure. In today’s economy, headlines like “Time Bomb in Corporate Debt,” “1.5 million homes in foreclosure in ‘09,” and “Turning off the Lights in Anderson” plaster magazine and newspaper covers. They are a constant reminder that failure and risk abound, and so does blame. But these provocative headlines, combined with yesteryear’s market failure, are a clarion call to reconsider business strategies in scarcer times. ©iStockphoto.com/kativ
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