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I don't want to give too much away here, but I PM at a company that makes stuff in the US, with an annual revenue for just this product line in the 10s of millions. Our success largely comes from being in a small Midwestern city and forming relationships with dozens of local small-medium fabricators. The kind of relationships where we invite them out to baseball games, when our parts are ready we drive a truck out to them, we stop by every once an a while with something that shouldn't have passed QC and point out to their faces what went wrong, etc.
About 50% of our success is that persistent and somewhat masculine relationship management. Flatter when they do well, reward when they do sufficiently, call out to their faces when they do badly. Call them cowards if they look hesitant. No matter what, never go a month without taking over the phone or in person. Solicit their input if they think there's a better way to fabricate what you're after. Oftentimes ignore their feedback, but in a way that shows you considered their input.
Masculine? Personal relationship where you remember their daughter's wedding is coming up and the tickets to the baseball game for the sales manager and Phil on the factory floor has your personal phone number sound more like the soft feminine skills. Emotional labour, no? 😁
But I'm not surprised by the story. The small local guys are too small to try moving operations outside of where they are so they settle for being "biggest parts maker in the tri-state north-eastern autumn quarter area" and do a reliable job on quality and price, the big top guys are using their legacy reputation and pivoting to be "yes you'll pay top dollar but we're the luxury brand that delivers on high quality" while the middle has all been indoctrinated in "shut down the plant that is the major employer in Booniesville, move production to Mexico or China where the costs and labour are one third the price, stock price goes up, bonuses for the C-suite all round!" so now they can't Make It Here anymore.
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Rather reminiscent of what they say about doing mid-level business in China. I wonder if there’s some structural factor?
Anyway, always interesting to hear from people with experience.
You have to be a real person to them. They have to feel like they're disappointing a real person if they mess up or take too long. You can't just be a customer where a failure is just a business problem, it has to be personal.
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