(In this ongoing series, The Cannata Report’s Editor-in-Chief Scott Cullen checks in with a different dealer each week to find out what’s going on at their dealership, what’s hot, what’s not, and whatever else is on their mind.)
In this installment of “Dealer Check-in,” we touch base with Chelsey Bode, president, Pearson-Kelly Technology, Springfield, MO. Pearson-Kelly offers MFPs, desktop printers, large-format printers, production print systems, label printers, and telephone systems. Its primary supplier is Konica Minolta. It also offers Managed IT and MPS. Here’s Chelsey’s check-in.
CR: We just kicked off the new year, how was January for Pearson-Kelly?
Bode: We just came off of our biggest year ever so January was blurry. We kicked off our vision for 2020 which continues to challenge our competitive team to no limits. Our theme this year is “All In.”
CR: What segments of the business are growing?
Bode: Managed IT Services and software solutions are our fastest growing categories. However, we did see OE hardware sales at an all-time high for 2019–36% growth YOY.
CR: What’s happening in the industry that has you concerned?
Bode: We look at the disruption of consolidation and change as opportunity. However, there are some concerning things that come along with this opportunity. The lack of software integration has really added some additional struggles to back-end operations. We want to be defined as all things business tech but run multiple systems to accomplish this—two unique CRM’s, two ERP’s, etc. It’s clunky, expensive, and not time efficient when on-boarding new employees or trying to be easy to do business with.
CR: What diversification opportunities are you looking most closely at in the coming year?
Bode: We are less focused on adding additional business categories and more focused on adding new geography. We are also putting a lot of weight on our marketing strategy for 2020.
CR: What industry events are you looking most forward to attending in 2020?
Bode: IT Nation and peer group meetings. I love collaboration on best practices.
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