In the last blog post we have talked about decision-making excellence. One of the learnings from the last blog article was that you should never stop a running horse. In our business context this means we believe that switching to another supplier poses an unknown risk and why bother if we are happy with our existing partners?
So, we have a very simple rule at etronics: Stick with what works well and change the partner if you are forced to and if you notice there is an unsurmountable gap between the two companies’ philosophies such as different quality expectations.
Naturally, we keep our minds open for new suppliers, but if there is not a specific strategic reason to look for a new one, we will not waste time on building new partnerships, which unnecessarily tie up lots of resources on our side or on the side of the supplier. We believe that we owe our partner manufacturers to be able to win new business if we start a new cooperation.
We strive to be a value-based company. Meaning we base our decisions on values. This is a decision-making rational we haven’t talked about in our last blog post, since it is not a universal success formula for decision-making in business – at least if you want to maximize turnover and profit.
One of the key values is trust. Trust is something that you earn over time. With the manufacturer Printec we share a strong trust bond, since we work over 30 years with them. As some of you might know, Printec has its core competence in the manufacturing of membrane switches, flex PCBS and custom-designed keypad solutions. There are numerous factors which has enabled Printec to grow up to almost 900 people with an annual turnover of more than 84 million US Dollar and a healthy annual growth rate of up to 10%, mostly because they have done a really good job for their customers.
The founder, who is both owner and CEO has an extraordinary business philosophy. He has understood that at the end of the day, business is about people. When you visit Printec you will immediately feel very welcome. The CEO and all the employees manage to give the customer the feeling of importance and make sure that their concerns are met. He has managed to ensure that this business rational is lived at all levels of the corporate hierarchy.
Unfortunately, many companies have lost this courtesy of how to treat customers. If you work with very big manufacturers you get the feeling that you are an irrelevant number and that you need to be grateful to be serviced. Since we believe that purchasing things is like a voting process for the future, we rather work with small, unlisted manufacturers. This allows us to build personal relationships and to bring outstanding results to our customers. We have experienced quite a few manufacturers who have been listed on the stock market in the past and unfortunately their business philosophy has drastically changed, which has made the cooperation with them more difficult and less fulfilling in terms of excellence for our customers. Therefore, we are very happy that Printec has stayed a family-owned business and has kept its personal touch and customer centeredness.
But Printec not only performs on the soft skill level, but also when it comes to manufacturing excellence. The CEO already said in the 90ies that he never wants to transfer the main factory to China. Printec wants to serve the Premium European and US market and to offer membrane switches which are technically a bit more difficult to produce. They not only are ISO 9001:2015 certified, but also perform in terms of environment (ISO 14001:2015I, automotive (IATF 16949:2016) and are also able to fulfill medical requirements (ISO 13485:2016). All in all, Printec fits very well in our supplier/partner portfolio. We have strong, knowledge-based, respectful and professional relations with their employees.
But Printec is not only amazing at maintaining excellent customer relations. They are aware of how important satisfied employees are for the long-term success. One of the way, they create employee loyalty is through a huge Chinese New Year celebration, almost exclusively for their employees. In the beginning of 2020, just before Corona, we had the honor to be invited to this special event. Only a few of their best clients and friends were invited to the staff party. Since we have a strong amicable bond to the owner of Printec, we had the honor to be placed at his table. It was a very memorable evening, and we are happy to share two videos with you. We were very surprised to see the management taking part in the stage performance, dancing for their subordinates. We want to thank all of Printec’s employees and especially Charlie, for their hard and excellent work for us and our customers. It really fills us with great gratitude to count on partners like Printec.
