Dear Guaranty:
It is about this time every year that my thoughts turn to the winter Olympics. I know, it seems odd that in the hottest month of the year I would be thinking of the winter Olympics but I do, and most specifically the two and four man bobsled competitions. You see, a bobsled run is very much like our business year. In a bobsled start, every member pushes just as hard as they can to get off to a good start, a lot like our January kickoff RV Palooza. A good start bodes well for a great finish, but the bobsled takes a bit to start picking up speed, a lot like our February and March. It is very important at that time, that the sled is driven as true as possible with the least wasted motion. As the slope increases, the bobsled starts to pick up speed, faster and faster (April and May), and still faster (June and July) till finally the sled is going as fast as it is likely to go (August and September) and the driver is driving at the very edge of disaster not daring to look back, because as any sled driver will tell you, only the ice ahead of you is the danger zone, not the ice behind you, just like us right now, going fast, but not losing control, products coming and going like an S curve, everything whizzing past us at blinding speed, the sled trying to find the perfect line, us straining for every deal, the sled crew hanging on for dear life, just like us and then the slope gets less, the speed comes down and the driver tries to squeeze out those last seconds and tenths of seconds that separate winners from losers till they cross the finish line (December). If the driver and crew have done everything right from start to finish, and not made any major mistakes, they have a good run, maybe a podium finish, just like us. So for the next few months, keep focused on the ice ahead of you, don’t look back, hang on tight, don’t get distracted and finish as well as you possibly can.
Have a great weekend everybody.
Ed
