PPB November 2017

by Greg Muzzillo Y ears ago, when I was growing my small distributorship, I secured an initial sales appointment with the operations manager of a jewelry retailer with about 100 stores. I have little recollection of what we discussed during that first sales call. All I remember was that after a seemingly good conversation, he asked me if we sold spiral ring notebooks. It turned out that he needed 12 spiral ring notebooks for a project. Twelve plain stock, one-inch spiral ring notebooks. I wasn’t sure how to respond. At no point in our conversation did I say we sold office supplies or anything of the sort, but I decided to bite and told him we could do that. I asked when he needed them, and he said, “tomorrow.” So, I went to the office supply store, bought the notebooks and personally delivered them the next day. That day was the beginning of an amazing, profitable relationship that lasted about 20 years until the jewelry chain was sold. He ended up buying about $1 million per year from me at 50-percent average gross profit. We never discussed that notebook order. He never ordered any more. From what I can tell, that request was a test. I think he wanted to know if I would be of service no matter how small the order. Let me ask you. Would you have passed the test? Or would you have told him you didn’t sell spiral ring notebooks? Or that you had a minimum order size? The reality is that when end users are considering a new supplier, they rarely start with a big order. Typically, they start with smaller, pain-in-the-neck-type orders. What I learned through this experience was that it’s not the size of the first order that counts — it’s the size of the opportunity. Greg Muzzillo founded industry distributor Proforma in 1978. Within five years he grew the company to several million in sales and by the mid-1980s Proforma was recognized by Inc. magazine as an Inc. 500 fastest-growing company three years in a row. Today, Proforma has more than 750 members and $500 million in sales. 12 Spiral Ring NotebooksThat Led To AMillion-Dollar Account 52 | NOVEMBER 2017 | GROW