It’s that time of year for the industry’s best and brightest students to take home their report cards. Instead of a semester or marking period, we’re evaluating the 2022 calendar year as a whole. All we need is those little manila envelopes that parents needed to sign and send back to school.
The good news is, we’re self-grading, so there’s no need to hide it from mom and dad. We’re breaking this into two parts: the first will cover how our industry’s dealer community graded its performance—both the positive remarks and areas that need improvement. Next week, our manufacturers, suppliers, distributors and other providers to the industry will weigh in with their observations.
Preston Woolfolk, DOCUmation: I believe our industry has become more flexible in equipment turns and fulfilling customer needs. On the flip side, it seems that most dealers decided to cut costs on innovation to streamline their profits. When profits start tightening, the most accessible place to eliminate is future development. This strategy works in the short run but can eventually leave long-term negative impacts.
Lauren Hanna, Blue Technologies: We would evaluate our 2022 performance as remarkable given everything that has happened. However, we are putting processes in place to make sure we are better prepared for the next obstacles. As a company, our solutions sales have always been strong; however, we saw a record spike in revenue as we explored ways to solve the problems our customers are facing. This is an area we can really grow in 2023.
Our traditional “down-the-street” business took a step backward in some markets. Our leadership team has done a deep dive into root causes and there isn’t any one in particular. We came up with a plan to grow and equip our traditional “territory” sales reps with more tools to solve prospective customer problems and show these prospects the level of service they will get—our Commitment to Excellence.
Jim Dotter, Virginia Business Systems: Our performance was remarkable in 2022 in how we dealt with supply chain issues and large implementations. We had multiple large and production print installations and worked closely with our partners and customers to execute complex solutions. We had a record year in product sales, which put tremendous pressure on our manufacturers to provide equipment. While the supply chain improved in Q4, significant revenue still rolls into 2023 and we foresee the supply chain to provide a more predictive fulfillment. In 2022, we saw success in larger government and educational environments, while simultaneously seeing a decline in SMB hardware purchases as that market navigated with remote work. The SMB market exploded with managed service opportunities as the remote work environment created a stronger need for IT management and security.
Dean Swenson, The Swenson Group: We are on track to exceed our top-line 2019 performance – which was our goal. In 2022, The Swenson Group made a number of automation investments that will help us better cover the market/play in more deals, etc. These are starting to pay dividends, but I believe they will really impact 2023 and beyond. We also have invested in new talent this year that should pay off in 2023.
Mason Smith, MTS Office Systems: I would give the industry a B-. Manufacturers have seemed to get better with some of the supply chain issues that plagued 2022; however, there is still room for improvement. The manufacturers were too consolidated in manufacturing in one area and it appears that most are diverting some production to other parts of the world. As dealers, we have had to be adaptive. Unfortunately, I believe that these issues have created a bigger gap in quality customer support. It seems clients are feeling the lack of quality support driven by scarce resources and so many acquisitions. The dealers that will continue to earn new business and keep their current clients will keep customer support at the forefront.
Melissa Confalone, Fraser Advanced Information Systems: Overall, 2022’s performance was strong. Those dealers that remain committed to finding relevant solutions to improve operations with their clients kept themselves at the fore. As an industry, we have greatly improved because we learned to pivot and produce plans that focus on areas that, prior to COVID, were just ideas. COVID really pushed all dealers to look at their offerings and find their way through with new programs and offerings, and that is now paying off.
Tyson Johns, Pearson-Kelly Technology: The industry did a great job with flexibility and being agile. Unfortunately, like in all situations, some handled this better than others, which then required dealers to be agile and flexible as well to adapt and survive.
Josh Salkin, EDGE Business Systems: We’re going to have by far our biggest year ever. We’ve seen tremendous net new growth, expansion of our interactive display and mailing divisions, made an acquisition and opened a new office organically. The supply chain was a major source of frustration for all dealers, but luckily things are trending in the right direction.
