Industry News & Information
Summary: TMA Turnaround of the Year 2012 Award
This is a summary version of the award winning turnaround Click here and read a detailed outline of the actions taken by Turning Point Management Advisors Situation A Family investment firm in the greater Midwest area invested in two trailer manufacturing companies and merged them together. The merged company had significant losses and made no profit after two years. Cash burn was[...]
Leading A Small To Mid Sized Foundry? It’s Time For A Profitability Pulse Check
A Foundry Industry Article From "Modern Casting"Part Of A Series Called “For The CEO”Click Here for an Acrobat version Of the original article In the January 2022 edition of Modern Casting, the foundry industry outlook was provided. While in 2020 we saw a decrease in revenue of 17% largely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, 2021 was a bounce-back year with $43.4 billion in revenue[...]
Succession Planning: Have You Started
You have spent your entire professional life owning and leading your family business. You are the founder or next-generation family member running the business and you are now approaching retirement age. To retire you will need to transfer your leadership responsibilities to a next generation family member and potentially some, or all, of your ownership. Have you prepared a plan to transfer the leadership[...]
Do You Know Your Numbers?
“So, what are you going to ship this month?” “Um, I don't know. Probably what we shipped last month.” “Was last month a good shipping month for you?” “I guess so.” This unfortunately is a typical exchange when speaking to owners or executives of many small to mid-sized companies who do not know their numbers! What do we mean by knowing your numbers? Since you[...]
The Pandemic Economy
Most would probably agree the first two months of 2020 were economically strong. But then as the country began to address the COVID-19 pandemic in March, state-mandated shutdowns across the country severely impacted many industries including most, if not all, foundries. Nonessential businesses were forced to close, and the unemployment rate went from 3.5%, a 50-year low, to an astounding 14.7% in two months. The[...]
Are You Maintaining Prices And Margins Relative To Costs?
Let's face it. Foundries are driven by strong margins. Are your margins acceptable? Or are your margins and return on sales (net income as a percentage of net sales) lower than you would like them to be? Or have you experienced a negative return due to net losses recently? In these cases, you most likely have an issue maintaining acceptable product margins through customer price[...]
