Don't Waste A Good Recession

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You may not want to build a Trillion Dollar company like Apple - but that doesn't mean you can't learn about business growth during a recession from Steve "Reality Distortion Field" Jobs.

Steve Jobs’s history with Apple is well known, but I want to focus on a very specific period. Not the mid-1980s when Jobs entered into a power battle and was sacked by his own company; and not the mid-2000s and beyond when the iPhone made Apple the first $1 Trillion dollar company in the world.

Let’s talk about the dot com bubble bursting, which coincided with Apple bringing Jobs back as CEO after the company almost collapsed several times during the 1990s. Jobs was initially the “interim CEO”; he dropped the “interim” and got serious in January of 2001.

What had changed was the bursting of the Dot Com bubble in the year 2000. You may recall. At the turn of the millennium there was a genuine belief that, maybe, the internet meant companies didn’t actually need to be profitable to be valuable. Cold reality kicked in a few months later, as interest rates rose, several large mergers failed to eventuate, and the Microsoft Anti-Trust ruling was handed down holding tech companies to the same rules as the rest of us.

The NASDAQ tech index lost 78% of its value, including 25% in a single week during April 2000. People who say the Coronavirus Recession is unprecedented just have short memories.

So what did Jobs do, to take a company that was struggling even during the boom and help it buck the trend? Well, he bucked the trend.

In May 2001, only a Quarter after taking on the official CEO role, Jobs announced the launch of the Apple Store. To stop Apple being poorly presented and undersold by third parties, he was taking back the retail channel to market directly. That’s like Kellogg’s Cornflakes deciding to take up cold calling at breakfast time.

Then in October 2001, after the events of September 11 sent the whole US economy into a Recession, Jobs launched the product that changed everything: the iPod. ““No wireless. Less [storage] space than a Nomad. Lame,” said Rob “CmdrTaco” Malda on Slashdot in a scathing review.

What Cmdr Taco and others failed to realise was that the iPod wasn’t created to be Apple’s hero product. It was designed to be small – by the standards of the day – and a cost-effective way of putting the Apple brand into more homes … and more pockets.

It was also cool, which helped with profit margins. Year on Year sales for Apple almost doubled; Profits were up almost 600%!

You can’t buy a Classic iPod today. Or some of the variants that followed, like the iPod Mini, Nano, and Shuffle. All discontinued. Apple Computers missed the best of the Dot Com Bubble, but with Steve Jobs they had a head start on the Dot Com Bust and the national recession that followed.

By thinking long term, they were able to launch a gateway product that saved the company and planted a seed for today, with iPhones, MacBooks, and more. In 1998, less than 1% of Americans bought an Apple product. By 2012, 50% of all Americans owned an Apple product – in fact, an average of 1.6 products. By 2017, that had grown even further, two-thirds of Americans and an average of 2.6 Apple products each.

Don’t Waste a Good Recession!

Remember to Like and Subscribe to help my business and yours!

This Weekly Economic Snapshot is designed to help you make better business decisions.

- Coronavirus LIVE Cases, Deaths, Change since Last Week

- Stockmarket Levels for FTSE, Dow Jones, ASX 200 and comparisons to the Peak and Previous Recession Low

- NEW Unemployment Rates and comparisons to Last Month and 5 Year Low

- UPDATED GDP Growth and comparison to previous two quarters

Join our next Live event in our free Facebook group at www.facebook.com/groups/GoodRecession

Welcome to "Don't Waste a Good Recession", a group with positive and practical advice for businesses from 2 to 500 staff.

If you want tangible advice you can execute now, not just more waffle, be sure to 'Like' this video and Subscribe to my channel.

If you Like this episode, tell your friends - then Subscribe and Share for more! Every download helps me to prepare more case studies and practical guidance for businesses with 2-500 employees.

This is "Don't Waste A Good Recession" Case Study #3 - Ruth Wakefield and the Toll House Inn.

In 1938, restaurant owner Ruth Wakefield and her husband Kenneth faced a challenge. You might remember the 1930s as ‘The Great Depression’, and bad as the first Recession was after the 1929 stock market crash, in many ways the second Recession during 1937-38 was even worse.

Ruth was a college educated dietician, and in 1930 she bought and became the chef at the Toll House Inn and restaurant in Whitman, Massachusetts.

The Toll House was named after the town, where travellers between Boston and the whaling city of New Bedford were once required to stop and pay a toll. It was a white Cape Cod style building that resembled a home which had overgrown, jutting out wings that housed the guest lodgings, kitchen and the dining area.

The Great Depression was not a great time to be in the restaurant business, especially one famous for its lobster dinners and fine desserts. At heart though Ruth had the entrepreneurial spirit – creativity in the kitchen, and in her business. The restaurant business was what it was; but that didn’t mean there weren’t other opportunities.

If you’ve ever wondered who invented the meat pie, or the hot dog, or banana bread – you may be surprised to discover that we know exactly who invented another food we take for granted: the choc-chip cookie.

It was Ruth Wakefield. Some stories say it was an accident, because God-forbid a female entrepreneur be allowed any credit. Ruth herself said it was quite deliberate.

So what did the Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookie give to Ruth and her business? A new product – one that could be sold individually, and at a low price. A product that could be transported – you didn’t have to eat it in her restaurant, and it would go on to become one of the favourite gifts sent to US Servicemen during World War Two.

And it wasn’t complicated. Ruth wrote a recipe book, which included the steps for how to make a Toll House Cookie at home. So delicious was the cookie, and so easily could it be made, Ruth was invited to be a guest on Betty Crocker’s nationally syndicated radio show.

In 1930, Ruth owned one business, an inn with an inhouse restaurant. By 1939, she had four: the inn, the restaurant which was open to the public, the cookbook, and the commercially produced take-away cookies. Cleverley – again, no accident – all four of them were unified under the Toll House Brand, and even today a “Toll House Cookie” in the US is a generic name for chocolate-chip.

Ruth sold the recipe, along with the Toll House Cookie brand, to Nestle in 1939. And her recipe still appears on their bags of chocolate chips.

In a time when restaurants were closing, a Recession when they had no other choice, Ruth created a new product, she opened a whole new market that was much, much larger, and she thrived.

Ruth Wakefield eventually printed 39 editions of her cookbook, and sold the Toll House Inn in 1966. She died, leaving an innovate cooking and business legacy, in January 1977.

What's the low cost or scalable product/service that your existing customers want to buy? How could you use the Coronavirus Recession to expand your product line and grow your Brand?

Remember to Like and Subscribe to help my business and yours!

The sad passing of Dame Vera Lynn this week reminded me of Dr Strangelove's final moments, and the clashed juxtaposition of world ending war and the uplifting song starts our episode for this week.

This Weekly Economic Snapshot is designed to help you make better business decisions.

- Coronavirus LIVE Cases, Deaths, Change since Last Week

- Stockmarket Levels for FTSE, Dow Jones, ASX 200 and comparisons to the Peak and Previous Recession Low

- NEW Unemployment Rates and comparisons to Last Month and 5 Year Low

- GDP Growth and comparison to previous two quarters

For a small to medium sized business channel, why do we care so much about what the stock markets are doing? First, it’s a lead indicator of the wider economy – market crashed in March, your business took a hit in April; markets bounced back in April and May, your business is doing better in May and June.

Second, it has an oversized impact on sentiment – business, consumer, and most importantly perhaps government. President Trump is already talking up the economy having rebounded, based on the markets – if they keep climbing, stimulus packages may end sooner, and that could have a negative effect on you and your customers

Every Recession is Different. Perhaps this time, Fiscal Policy – aka, Government Stimulus and Intervention – will pump up the economy for 18 months.

In just the past 2 weeks, I’ve had 1-on-1 conversations with more than 20 business owners – and every single one of them is reporting sentiment that this will go south in September / October when government programs end.

The good news is – if everyone things it’s the case, it probably won’t happen.

The bad news – that could mean governments creating more debt to keep things pumping; or it could mean it goes sooner.

Remember – nobody wants to be the first domino in case they’re too early; but everyone wants to be the second domino.

I can’t tell you the exact trigger – but when the party ends, expect to see another 1000 or even 2000 point down day drop on the Dow Jones.

On the markets, you might still end up ahead of where you were 3 months or 12 months ago.

On the business front, you absolutely can make sure you’re ahead.

Join our next Live event in our free Facebook group at www.facebook.com/groups/GoodRecession

Welcome to "Don't Waste a Good Recession", a group with positive and practical advice for businesses from 2 to 500 staff.

If you want tangible advice you can execute now, not just more waffle, be sure to 'Like' this video and Subscribe to my channel.

Thank you for Liking, Subscribing, and Sharing! Every download helps me to prepare more case studies and practical guidance for businesses with 2-500 employees.

This is "Don't Waste A Good Recession" Case Study #2 - a High Street retailer I personally coached in London during the Great Recession / Global Financial Crisis.

My team ran our usual strategic planning over the organisation:

- Capacity Planning via the Capacity Engine

- A Full RNR Project

- Sales Training

but the most obvious benefit came from reviewing their pricing - and reintroducing a Product that they never sold.

Find out how this benefited the business, and learn more about Anchor Pricing and the research that supported our strategy.

If you enjoy talking about Pricing, you'll love my other videos on the topic - check the Don't Waste a Good Recession YouTube channel for more!

Remember to Like and Subscribe to help my business and yours!

This Weekly Economic Snapshot is designed to help you make better business decisions.

- Coronavirus LIVE Cases, Deaths, Change since Last Week

- Stockmarket Levels for FTSE, Dow Jones, ASX 200 and comparisons to the Peak and Previous Recession Low

- NEW Unemployment Rates and comparisons to Last Month and 5 Year Low

- GDP Growth and comparison to previous two quarters

Are the green shoots of recovery premature? Lockdown restrictions are beginning to ease, even though Active COVID-19 Cases remains at record highs in countries like the UK and USA.

Stockmarkets in the US approached the pre-Pandemic highs ... before dropping sharply at the end of this week. And while US Unemployment numbers were down for the month of May 2020, new jobless claims were still 3 times higher than the pre-2020 record.

Join our next Live event in our free Facebook group at www.facebook.com/groups/GoodRecession

Welcome to "Don't Waste a Good Recession", a group with positive and practical advice for businesses from 2 to 500 staff.

If you want tangible advice you can execute now, not just more waffle, be sure to 'Like' this video and Subscribe to my channel.

Thank you for Liking, Subscribing, and Sharing! Every download helps me to prepare more case studies and practical guidance for businesses with 2-500 employees.

This is "Don't Waste A Good Recession" Case Study #1 - a professional services firm I personally coached in London during the Great Recession / Global Financial Crisis.

After years of steady growth, the 2008/09 Recession saw their revenue drop from £3 million pa to £2 million pa ... and worse still, it stagnated there for almost two years.

The solutions they were trying weren't working, so in early 2011 with the second of the double-dip recessions on the horizon the new CEO called me in to help.

I recommended 3 strategic priorities, helped design the strategy with their senior team, and then coached the business across the UK to implement all three.

As a result, when the projects completed in late 2012 the business had doubled to £4 million and could see the ongoing return on their investment in business advisory services.

Could you do the same?

The first Australian Recession in 30 years is now official - according to the Australian Government at least!

This Weekly Economic Snapshot is designed to help you make better business decisions. If it helps, make sure you Like and Subscribe for every update.

- Coronavirus LIVE Cases, Deaths, Change since Last Week

- Stockmarket Levels for FTSE, Dow Jones, ASX 200 and comparisons to the Peak and Previous Recession Low

- Unemployment Rates and comparisons to Last Month and 5 Year Low

- NEW GDP Growth and comparison to previous two quarters

Is this "The Recession we had to have?" No, in the sense that modern Fiscal Policy can make Technical Recessions avoidable ... but Yes, in the general sense of an economic downturn, this one was inevitable. What are you doing in your business to benefit?

Join our next Live event in our free Facebook group at www.facebook.com/groups/GoodRecession

Welcome to "Don't Waste a Good Recession", a group with positive and practical advice for businesses from 2 to 500 staff.

If you want tangible advice you can execute now, not just more waffle, be sure to 'Like' this video and Subscribe to my channel.

Is this a Dead Cat Bounce / Bull Trap, or signs of an economic recovery and a V-Shaped Recession?

This Weekly Economic Snapshot is designed to help you make better business decisions. If it helps, make sure you Like and Subscribe for every update.

- Coronavirus LIVE Cases, Deaths, Change since Last Week

- Stockmarket Levels for FTSE, Dow Jones, ASX 200 and comparisons to the Peak and Previous Recession Low

- Unemployment Rates and comparisons to Last Month and 5 Year Low

- GDP Growth and comparison to previous two quarters

- Plus this week a bonus deep dive into Dead Cats and Bull Traps over time.

Global stock markets have rebounded strongly from the initial Coronavirus Pandemic sell-off. The FTSE, Dow Jones, and ASX 200 (among others) are now below the 20% Decline used by many to define a 'Bear Market'.

Does that mean the Bulls are ascendant again? Some experts are predicting that the economic fallout from the Pandemic may be smaller than feared - and while that would be great news for your small business, the rest of the my research suggests it's a little optimistic and naive.

Join our next Live event in our free Facebook group at www.facebook.com/groups/GoodRecession

Welcome to "Don't Waste a Good Recession", a group with positive and practical advice for businesses from 2 to 500 staff.

If you want tangible advice you can execute now, not just more waffle, be sure to 'Like' this video and Subscribe to my channel.

This Weekly Economic Snapshot is designed to help you make better business decisions. If it helps, make sure you Like and Subscribe for every update.

- Coronavirus LIVE Cases, Deaths, Change since Last Week

- Stockmarket Levels for FTSE, Dow Jones, ASX 200 and comparisons to the Peak and Previous Recession Low

- NEW Unemployment Rates and comparisons to Last Month and 5 Year Low

- GDP Growth and comparison to previous two quarters

- Plus this week a bonus deep dive into the rate of Active Coronavirus Case Growth across 13 different countries and globally.

Some countries continue to grow week after week - including Sweden, the UK, the USA, Russia, Brazil, Canada, and South Africa. Other countries continue to decline Active Case numbers every week - including Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, and some countries / territories impacted earliest like Spain, Italy, and Hong Kong.

What does that mean for easing Lockdown restrictions? And even if restrictions are lifted and people can go to work or can go out to spend money, will they actually do so in a country that has growing cases 'above the line'?

Join our next Live event in our free Facebook group at www.facebook.com/groups/GoodRecession

Welcome to "Don't Waste a Good Recession", a group with positive and practical advice for businesses from 2 to 500 staff.

If you want tangible advice you can execute now, not just more waffle, be sure to 'Like' this podcast and Subscribe to my channel.