Wednesday, December 14, 2005

The Puzzle Pieces Fall Into Place?

What would you think if the shelves in your store stayed empty for weeks on end, shipments were irregular and smaller than normal, they stopped sending store supplies (toilet paper, paper towels, pens, paper clips, etc.), some vendors stopped delivering to the store altogether because they weren't getting paid…….

For a few weeks we excused it because of inclement weather and other extenuating circumstances. After the bills were paid deliveries started again and the shelves began to return to normal. However, a few weeks later the situation repeated itself. The office is also cracking down on when we're allowed to refund money. Our paychecks have arrived on time and in full so far, with the exception of the week-long power outage.

What do you think? Should I be worried?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You should be worried. I am assuming your store sells a lot of holiday mercahndise/or merchandise that would sell a bit better during the holidays. The behavior you cite is classic cashflow stretching as the company is trying to make it through a high inventory and high borrowing period. If the merchandise onteh floor starts to stagnate--January will be dicey. That means no bonus more than going ch 11--unless this has been going on for a bit.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, worry. You can stretch payments for a while before vendors stop shipping. That's a bad, bad sign. The bigger the company is, the worse a sign it is when the vendors won't ship.