Issue link: https://nbm.uberflip.com/i/1491555
G R A P H I C S - P R O. C O M A P R I L 2 0 2 3 • G R A P H I C S P R O 2 1 Your customers are a gold mine I suspect that you have a much larger list of customers than those you would clas- sify as "current" customers (the ones that have purchased in the last 12-18 months). Time spent reaching out to past customers is usually time well spent. Call them, drop them a note in the mail, or email them. Let them know you are still around and serving the people and businesses in your community or market. Simply putting yourself back in their awareness is likely to generate new or repeat orders from some of these past customers. Know your hourly numbers Operating costs play a direct role in your profits. Net profit per hour is your total net profit before taxes, divided by reve- nue-producing hours. Said another way, net profit per hour equals the net profit you make on an order before taxes, divided by the number of machine and man hours it took to unpack, inspect, hoop, stitch, trim, fold, and pack that order. is is the number by which you can measure the profitability of that order, and of your business. If this number is lower than you need, take steps to increase it. You can increase prices, increase pro- duction efficiency, lower production costs, lower overhead, or add upsells so that your customers spend more money with each order. If you have not increased your prices within the past 12 months, it is time to do so, even if only by a small amount. Upsells could be adding a bagging and tagging option where you sort the finished order and bag and label the job with recip- ients' names. Or you could offer delivery — for a fee. You could also offer person- alization of company apparel for a fee. If (Image courtesy Krissi Dane, KDdidDesigns LLC)