The Pulse of the Garden Center Industry

The Pulse of the Garden Center Industry

by Steve Bailey

You might think the title of this article is a bit of a stretch when describing The Group’s 2018 Profit & Loss Study. I don’t. There’s nothing in our industry that even approaches the depth of information reporting centers receive.

This year’s report is even more special due to the number of quality reports used to compile the results. Before this year, the highest number of centers reporting to The Study was seventy-eight in 2016. Once again, we hit that same number in 2018. One footnote is that as I reviewed each one, I could tell the integrity of the reports received this year were even better than just two years ago. Good job.

Let’s turn to the report itself and, more importantly, some of the results. What’s that one metric that all Owners and Managers watch? Revenues. The average Revenues for all reporting centers was $2,231,000. The good news is they increased in 2018 vs. 2017 at the rate of 2.8%. Not a huge jump, but better than flat or declining Revenues. If your center experienced a larger increase, congratulations. If not, why not?

One very unrecognized and huge benefit of increased Revenues is in lowering expense percentages. Fixed expenses will decrease and variable expenses should, but do they? Only if managed properly. Nothing is automatic in small business, and variable expenses are a prime example of that. As you can see, increased Revenues can, and do, hide a multitude of management issues. This has never been more evident than in the P&L Study over the past three years. That’s one thing we’ll discuss in Nashville.

Along those lines, we began analyzing the results from the 2018 Profit & Loss Study. Next article, we’ll continue that process. But we cannot get as detailed as you might like (hey, even I know that would be a snoozer!), so we’ll leave that for the P&L Study Session at Fall Event 2019 in Nashville. Join us on Monday afternoon, and we’ll talk regions and sales groups, as well as the benchmarks established by the Best Practices/High Achiever group.

The fact this report is even possible is due to your involvement with The Garden Center Group. It isn’t me or any other Service Provider in The Group, it’s you. It can’t happen without you. I talk with consultants from other retail segments, and they can’t believe how open and sharing all of you are. For that, we all say a big ‘thank you’ for participating.

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Got questions or need more information about The Group's Annual P&L Study, the Weekly Department Review (WDR) or your profitability? Give Steve a call or email.

Steve Bailey
Tel: 618.319.9205
Cell: 618.521.5225
Email: CLICK HERE

Steve Bailey is a service provider for The Garden Center Group and manages all Group financial sharing programs. The Weekly Department Review (WDR) and The Annual P&L Study are industry exclusives developed by The Garden Center Group and are included in your retainer!

REMEMBER: Your interaction (by phone and email) with Group Service Providers such as Steve Bailey, Robert Hendrickson, Sid Raisch, Jean Seawright, and John Kennedy are included in your retainer! So what are you waiting for? Take advantage of all that The Group has to offer and give them a call or send an email now!

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