Michael Griffin is director of corporate sales for Garcia’s Woodworks in Fontana, California. Garcia’s Woodworks was founded by Nicholas Garcia in 1978. Today, the family-operated company has multiple locations in California and also supplies new and recycled pallets to customers in Arizona and Nevada.
PALLET ENTERPRISE: What is the best piece of business advice that you have ever received?
Griffin: Focus on customer satisfaction and retention. It is much easier to keep an existing customer than to acquire a new one. By way of example, we believe it is important to prioritize spending resources on our customer service department because we have consistently received a significant return on that spending.
PALLET ENTERPRISE: Have you recently started pursuing any new markets/product lines?
Griffin: A recent, expanded and immediate need for lumber resources has afforded us unique opportunities to help our customers’ businesses grow. For example, a short time ago, we expanded our business into the international market to meet the growing needs of several valued clients. We were particularly excited to take on the challenges of doing so because we felt that stepping into that space makes us even more indispensable to new and existing customers who have a global presence.
Likewise, we have recently spent significant resources expanding our customer base throughout the Western U.S., often hand in hand with existing customers looking to do the same with their businesses. In particular, we have experienced explosive growth in Arizona and Nevada.
PALLET ENTERPRISE: How do you decide whether or not to try a new idea in your company?
Griffin: If the change is a self-motivated one, we employ something like the scientific method: we commit a modest number of resources to test multiple new ideas and analyze the results before committing the company one way or another. For example, we are currently considering adopting a new pallet design software. Our process for that change includes tests of multiple software platforms as well as dialogue with our customers to ensure that any change is beneficial for both us and our clients.
PALLET ENTERPRISE: What is one of the hardest business decisions you have ever made?
Griffin: COVID-19 impacts forced us to make very hard decisions about payroll and staffing, and we seriously considered layoffs in the early days of the pandemic. Our leadership ultimately made the decision to keep every single employee on the payroll, and that decision paid off. In compliance with California’s rigorous pandemic regulatory regime, we managed to remain open for our regularly scheduled business hours throughout the entire pandemic. In spite of our very real fears about the state of the market, our decision benefitted us and resulted in sustainable growth for the duration of the pandemic.
Conversely, if we had laid off employees, we likely would not have been able to reliably service our customers and assist them in keeping goods like masks and hand sanitizer flowing throughout the country when the need for such goods was paramount.
PALLET ENTERPRISE: What is the most important lesson you’ve learned about customer service?
Griffin: Don’t overpromise. Let your ‘yes’ be a ‘yes’ and your ‘no’ be a ‘no.’
PALLET ENTERPRISE: Have economic changes over the past few years changed the way you manage your company? How?
Griffin: Frankly, COVID-19 changed how we do things forever. We had to learn to be flexible in all aspects of the company operations. Throughout the pandemic, we worked with our customers on monthly (and sometimes even weekly) price point changes for goods and services. This was a significant workload for our team, but our customers needed that service to survive a very difficult time. Going forward, we have continued to be extremely attuned to rapidly shifting supply markets as a service to potentially impacted customers.
