Archive for the 'My businesses' Category

Service Done Right – Insurance Broking Par Excellance

Published by Ben Kepes on December 17, 2009 in Business and My businesses. 0 Comments

All too often this blog has been a place to critique service that I’ve received from commercial providers – generally bad service is the impetus to sit down and write. Maybe it’s a seasonal thing but it seemed appropriate to send out a bouquet for fantastic service.

As most reader know, I own several different businesses encompassing manufacturing, property (commercial and residential) and consultancy – all of this means insurance is a major, complex and time consuming task.

Roughly two years ago we decided to consolidate all our insurance under one broker – property, vehicles, life/trauma, public liability, home and contents. After a recommendation from a friend we contact Jeremy Bernstein from the Christchurch office of Crombie Lockwood who spent an inordinate amount of time learning the nuances of our various businesses, our life situation and our appetite for calculated risk.

We moved all our policies to Crombie Lockwood and now, a couple of years and several claims down the track I can say we’ve acquired an excellent insurance broker but more importantly a totally trusted adviser who understands and deeply cares about our business.

I was reminded of the fact yesterday when I spent a good hour talking with Jeremy about where our business was going and parallels he saw with other businesses he deals with. And then, in an act that is indicative of the fact that he works for a relationship driven organisation, this morning Jeremy dropped off a gift – not the traditional cheesy calendar or bottle of cheap wine, but a metre tall Kauri seedling, a reminder of the fact that Tane Mahuta, the iconic Kauri tree, is Crombie Lockwood’s corporate icon.

So there you go… well done Jeremy and Crombie Lockwood. Anyone looking for an insurance broker would be hard pressed to find a better service…

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Why Banking is Broken, A BNZ Rant (Part two)

Published by Ben Kepes on September 14, 2009 in Business, My businesses, New Zealand and Strategy. 9 Comments

I posted last week about a banking situation that had me all hot under the collar. In an effort to continue naming and shaming (and hopefully drive improvements in the process), here is part two.

This morning I received a check from a US client. The client in question is a $5 billion per annum business – not exactly a shaky bet. The check itself was written via JPMorgan Chase, last time I looked a fairly stable bank.

Previously I’d been told by branch staff that depositing foreign currency checks had to be done in person – I therefore dutifully traipsed the 15 minutes or so to the branch, filled out the very old fashioned deposit slip and took it to the teller who told me…. that they couldn’t do it. Apparently (and in very technical language);

We can’t bank US dollar checks because of the American thing… the dollars.. the bank… Sorry

I kicked up a stink (collar very hot by now) and the poor teller went and got her supervisor who told me that;

Well you know, with all those US banks falling over we don’t like doing checks… You could send it back and ask them to pay you by wire. Or we could hold the funds for thirty days and charge you [lots of] fees for doing so…

Luckily the week before our “business banker” has met with us in an effort to “understand the business better”. I told him at the time that we didn’t want very much from our bank but, when we asked for something, we wanted it dealt with quickly. The teller tried to phone the business banker who was “on leave” today but luckily the mention of his name made the teller jump a little and she graciously offered to cash the check “but only this one time” but would hold the funds for a minimum of thirty days.

Now I understand that local banks are shy of failed banks and that they’re scared of left holding the can. But to refuse at point blank to serve a customer, and only deal with their concerns after they jump up and down and demand service, is pitiful. Yes the client in question should have paid by wire and yes sometimes a withholding period is needed to ensure that a check cleared but, notwithstanding any of that, we now have a particularly unhappy customer who is left somewhat demoralised by claims of the bank to “partner with their customers”.

Ah well, maybe a business banker might see this and respond… oh I forgot, they don’t use the interwebs….

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Time for a the BNZ Rant, They Don’t Get It….

Published by Ben Kepes on September 7, 2009 in Business, IT, My businesses and New Zealand. 3 Comments

My fellow blogger Lance Wiggs tends to be a bit of a curmudgeon when it comes to banks in new Zealand, in light of the fact that he’s sitting somewhere in the middle of Africa, I figured I’d take up the baton.

I’ve banked with the Bank of New Zealand for over 25 years now. Between myself, my own business and my related entities (see here and here) , I’m part of a dozen or so business accounts with them – most of which include business lending. Over the 25 years I’d hate to think how much I’ve spent on mortgage interest and bank and transaction fees – I’ve always been happy to do so however, receiving as we do the services of a business manager who (sometimes) tries to understand our business and be proactive around that.

A couple of years however the BNZ changed its systems and we were moved from our business manager onto a business partner. While this may same purely a semantic change, it would seem that this tier of bankers are little more than retail staffers on their way up, unaccustomed to what is important to business. I even proactively offered to invite my banker into my businesses Xero accounts to give them some visibility over how the businesses are doing – that suggestion was several hundred meters over the heads of these staffers (which is ironic given the BNZ’s shareholding in Xero).

A couple of weeks ago our business partner went on leave and was replaced. Around the same time one of our mortgages ended its fixed period and I decided I wanted to alter the facility somewhat. Despite promises that the documents would be ready in a week – it is now three weeks later and the documents just showed up, and they are incorrect.

Add to this the fact that the business partner rang me the other day to ask for a debtors list of an associated, but separate business, and the fact that we’ve been charged an errant search fee and despite requests haven’t had the charge replaced, and one can see that the BNZ is rapidly losing it’s appeal.

I may be wrong but I would have thought that the combined accounts of businesses with several million in turnover, combined debt of well over seven figures and an annual banking spend of many thousands of dollars, would have warranted a bit of service. Maybe I was wrong.

I’m not quite ready to move to another business bank, but suffice it to say that if someone was willing to take the time to understand my businesses, was prepared to offer a reasonable level of service, and could get the basics right… I’d consider it.

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Yikes! The Ryans are at it again

Published by Ben Kepes on August 21, 2009 in Business, Design, Manufacturing, My businesses, New Zealand, New business and cloudave. 5 Comments

logo The Ryan brothers are something of a powerhouse of Kiwi entrepreneurship and innovation. Between them Doctors Shaun and Grant (underachievement obviously being a familial trait!) have set up and been involved in a raft of exciting companies – GlobalBrain, Eurekster, SLI Systems among them. They’re also involved in a bunch of different government boards – the New Zealand Venture Investment Fund and Foundation for Research Science and Technology among them. They’re also semi-regular attendees at our monthly Christchurch Web lunches (at the Twisted Hop, taking advantage of the great $20 Pizza and Pint specials)

The latest exciting thing to come out of Chez Ryan, is codenamed Project Garlic but slowly peeping out from it’s cloak of secrecy.

Several years in the making, and the culmination of some smart design, smart thinking and smart manufacturing, YikeBike is the worlds smallest lightest electric folding bicycle at less than 10kg.

Still under wraps to all but a select few, the YikeBike is going to be launched to the world on Sept 2 at the EuroBike expo.

This is very cool on a number of levels;

  • Anything that gets cars off the roads is a good thing
  • It’s a great example of smart Kiwi design
  • The Ryans could well be running their businesses from Silicon Valley – the fact that they’ve chosen to remain here in New Zealand is inspiring
  • The teaser video has the sounds, and face, of New Zealand/Icelandic singer/songwriter Hera who is a very cool chick!
  • I had a small part in the project – Cactus Climbing did some design and prototyping work for the YikeBike carrying solution

Good luck Grant – I’ll be watching on September 2nd!

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Government 2.0 – A Way to Go

Published by Ben Kepes on June 15, 2009 in Economic Development, Efficiency, Governance, IT, My businesses, New Zealand, Society and Strategy. 2 Comments

Jim posted the incredible story of the New Zealand Immigration Service (NZIS) proposing a $117 million upgrade of IT infrastructure, a sum that equates, from Jim’s reckoning, to $234k per NZIS process worker.

It’s a sorry tale and one that, as Jim points out, smacks of desperation, silo building and vested interests. Given the somewhat depressing post I thought I’d revisit a success story for Government 2.0.

I’ve long been a fan of New Zealand’s Ministry of Economic Development – long before co-founding a community site for New Zealand small businesses, I was involved (and continue to be so) with economic development and advisory work for SMEs as well as running my own small businesses – in my dealings with the various branches of the Ministry of Economic Development (MED), I found them to be effective and efficient. This impression was strengthened with their wholesale adoption of modern communication channels in order to engage with their “clients”. it doesn’t matter which channel you look at – if their constituents embrace it, it’s a sure bet that the various MED departments will soon be there.

Recently I met with another Government department that I’ll leave anonymous. They’re also striving to engage with their constituents. The people I talked to were invariably passionate advocates for the enabling force that engaging with their client base can be – unfortunately their department has some silos within it, people who for whatever reason attempt to block the sort of initiatives their colleagues over at the MED embrace. The result? Frustrated staff, programmes that lack the reach they could otherwise attain and, most importantly for those who evangelise the democratizing power of Government 2.0, inefficiencies that affect the very SMEs these departments are set up to help.

So circling back to the genesis of this post – the NZIS plan for IT upgrading, I’m sure there’s some people within the service who have been flying the flag for quick and relatively economic solutions to the inefficiencies apparent in the system – and you can bet they’re blocked at every turn by anti-progressive and institutionalised individuals who can’t see past the status quo.

Shame…

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The Consumerisation of Design, the Death of Fitness for Purpose

Published by Ben Kepes on May 14, 2009 in Business, Design, Manufacturing and My businesses. 0 Comments

On my way to the United States, US Airways unfortunately misplaced my bag. Faced with the prospect of a week without my stuff i made a quick assessment of what I really couldn’t do without. Top of the list 9after a NZ/US power adaptor) was my gym gear. I trundled on down to the Denver NikeTown to fix myself up – and therein lies the genesis of this post.

The sales assistant at the store was really friendly and obviously knew everything there is to know about the Nike product line – i heard all about stone protection, Kevlar fibres, midsole impact cushioners and the like – but was surprised at how little the sales banter actually looked at my body, my use case and my needs.

I ended up buying a lovely pair of shoes (a size too large – he didn’t actually check that part) which I’ll go and replace today. My beef however isn’t with this guy, he was only doing his job. It’s with a society that forgets the actual purpose of a product in favour of some aesthetic or vanity induced criterion.

My last experience with buying shoes was at The Frontrunner in Christchurch. That time I was put on a treadmill, slow-motion videoed and the sales assistant (actually worthy of the title technician) discussed the specific traits i displayed and what shoe features to look for in order to correct those traits.

The sad thing is that Nike has its genesis in high level athletics, but now it’s just another label pimping new products every season – and rapidly inventing new “design features” every season to do so.

Ahhh – it makes me proud to be involved with a company that (shameless plug) doesn’t design for planned obsolescence, has an approach of “ethic construction” and is pleased that its products look, and work, similar from one season to the next.

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What Part of Rampant Consumerism do People Not Get?

Published by Ben Kepes on December 16, 2008 in Business, Business and the Environment, Economic Development, Efficiency, Manufacturing, My businesses and Society. 2 Comments

Doing the rounds at the moment is a UK Sunday Star Times story about an undercover operation at an Amazon warehouse. Basically the reporter discovered terrible working conditions, very high demands on staff and not allowance for sick days off.

The thing that caused the shock for people (we all seem to have grown accustomed to near-slave labour in Eastern countries) was that this warehouse was in the UK – Milton Keynes to be precise.

Dennis Howlett posted about the incident saying;

If companies like Amazon can get away with this kind of exploitation then what next? Is this something that a civil society should tolerate? I don’t think so.

Reputation matters and to date, Amazon has ridden a wave of enthusiasm for its innovative approach to product distribution. But if exploitation is what it take to keep prices low then I’d rather pay a few coppers more if it ensures that workers are offered decent conditions.What the Times discovered does not qualify, even if it is technically within the law. What is the matter with Amazon management? Are they becoming the latest victims of excuse based decision making where if the law says it’s OK, then it’s OK?

Dennis is a fantastic guy and I bow down to his enterprise software pedigree but when it comes to the downstream effects of international trade and a consumer society, he is hopelessly naieve. As I said by way of comment on his post;

Dennis – I hate to say it but the fact that you’re surprised completely floored me. This Amazon story is a natural result of relentless downwards pressure on price. The move of (almost) all production to the east, and the rise of the super-consumer society has created a demand for low cost/high efficiency operations like Amazon – and how do they remain efficient and drive prices down? By sourcing goods from the lowest cost manufacturing countries and treating staff like disposable commodities.

Don’t people see that this is our fault? Amazon are just fulfilling a demand…

And that from someone who still proudly owns a business manufacturing 100% in the West (in this case http://www.cactusclimbing.co.nz and production entirely in New Zealand – well paid staff, clean /light/airy workplaces and a fun environment all included)

Of late I’ve bitten my tongue while those around me espouse the undeniable benefits of international trade. I too am a proponent of trade – but there is a difference between trade per se and fair trade. This is borne out by comments like this one;

The prices Amazon chooses to offer should have no bearing on whether they operate like slave camp owners. That’s a well understood business principle. People don’t realize this kind of thing is going on. That matters.

Price charged and cost structure are inextricably linked. As a society we have driven down the price we are wiling to pay but tried to ignore the social toll that the cost reductions needed to achieve that price have caused.

We shouldn’t blame the vendors for that.

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Testing the Made from New Zealand widget

Published by Ben Kepes on December 10, 2008 in Economic Development, My businesses, New Zealand, New business and Strategy. 1 Comment

I got an email from the [mfnz]Made From New Zealand[/mfnz] guys sayign that they have just released their new widget aimed at getting comapny information to show after blog posts (yup – much like crunchbase for for NZ companies. Check out my entires – [mfnz]bizchat[/mfnz], [mfnz]Cactus Climbing[/mfnz] and [mfnz]Diversity[/mfnz].

It seems to work (see below) and is ye another way to increase link love and ultimately link love for Kiwi businesses. Our vision with bizchat is more about building business capability rather than increasing business exposure – butween MFNZ and bizchat we’ll set the kiwi buisiness world rocking!

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Why Not e-dollars?

Published by Ben Kepes on October 21, 2008 in Business, Economic Development, Efficiency and My businesses. 6 Comments

Awhile ago I was involved with a start up that was trying to create a barter driven system for online transactions, leveraging the power of the community rating, meritocracy and subversion of traditional currencies to both lubricate commerce and cut out a number of the middle men" who add drag to commerce,

The start up never really got off the ground – our timing was a little off, the potential investors and partners weren’t too interested and our bandwidth got compressed to a ping where it had to be relegated to the back burner. I still firmly believe in the concept however and so was stoked to read this post over on Aardvark Daily asking whether the time was in fact right for a cyber-dollar, a cross border standard currency, to be introduced.

I have to say a resounding YES. The current economic situation, coupled with the vagaries of our banking and financial system – make the return of barter, but with a web-enabled meritocratic twist, a complete no-brainer. It might be just about time to dust off that presentation from a year ago or so.

What does the community think – a return to barter? Or not?

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Another one bites the dust…

Published by Ben Kepes on August 23, 2008 in Business, Economic Development, Manufacturing, My businesses, New Zealand, Society and Strategy. 2 Comments

Its been a few months since I had a rant about the demise of first world manufacturing. Sure there are companies like American Apparel and my own Cactus Climbing creating a brand story out of retaining a first world manufacturing ethos but they are in the minority.

News this morning that yet another apparel manufacturer is closing down, citing cheap imports as the main reason for their demise. Apart from the obvious concerns about the social, economic and environmental impacts of moving production to third world countries (has anyone noticed the air at the Beijing Olympics?), on a more personal note it’s sad to see a bunch of skilled craftspeople no longer employed through no fault of their own.

It makes me, once again, want to suggest that we all have a look at the country of origin of the garments we’re all wearing today and once we’ve done that check out this movie – it’s all food for thought…

[Postscript - interesting to note that one of the companies in the movie, Macpac, is no longer, despite their move to third world manufacturing. Maybe the answer isn't as simple as offshoring our impacts????]

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