Have you been disappointed in recent years with your cash flow or profitability as you have been forced to deal with warm winters, greater regulation, stubborn inflation, and high interest rates? Or maybe you really want more stability with year-over year results, regardless of the weather or economy. If you’ve been wracking your brain trying to find ways to turn things around...
The article “Navigating Propane Market Volatility” written by Phil Baratz (published in BPN, June 2024) explores the key strategies that enable retail propane distributors to confidently navigate uncertainty and thrive in a dynamic market.
Did you know that the Federal Reserve (Fed) does not use the Consumer Price Index (CPI) to track inflation? The Fed prefers to track a much less familiar index known as Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE). PCE measures the change in consumer spending on the actual goods and services that households are currently purchasing. PCE considers substitutions made by households and is more flexible.
In his recent article, featured in the January issue of Fuel Oil News, Rashaan Baskerville discusses how a current interest phenomenon may provide you with a rare opportunity to significantly reduce your interest expenses.
A budget is a financial plan based upon your business goals, which forecasts profit and loss within each area of your company to define your net income for the year. Developing a sound budget is all about quantifying your business model for the next 12 months. What are the elements that drive your business and…
Now that the winter is behind us, dealers are reflecting on how things went financially and how to shift gears for the remainder of the year to get back on track with their annual profit targets. Before you can decide how to pivot, you need to know what target to aim for.
It's a great time to improve your profitability in your Service (and Installation) department. In the past, the Service department had traditionally been a loss leader for most dealers and, therefore, represented one of the biggest and quickest opportunities for a dealer to grow their profitability. This remains true to this day, despite the fact that most full-service dealers have already transitioned their Service departments from a loss leader to a profit center.
When working on improving your cash flow, there are three key steps to take to make large and lasting changes. Each step can be broken down into concrete actions that you can take starting right now.
In any business, in any industry, the “3 legs” that are required to support a business are Sales, Operations, and Finance. Sales can include sales, marketing, customer support and retention, data analytics, social media, etc. Operations includes “everything you do” to serve your customers. In our industry, it is primarily delivery of fuels and the installation and servicing of heating and cooling equipment. Finance includes everything from budgeting, analyzing, reporting, banking, credit, hedging, and more.
Many factors are conspiring to squeeze you this winter and the impact could be significant. The good news is that owners and managers have time to plan before the chilly days return and your need for cash to support seasonal operations grows again.
