Cost cutting exercise.....

[NI Tree]

do not be a cheapskate when it comes to looking after machinery, put time in to keeping it clean, and make a point of doing it, and make all the lads make shore they leave them clean at the end of the day. eg brush the cab out, it means that you can keep an eye on the gear and they have to show respect to it as if they do not it means they have to do more cleaning exctra. but also cheek the been greasing them exctra as well. it means you can also inspect the gear with out getting very ditty.

 

a stich in time save nine,

[TRADITIONAL LOGGERS]

Weekly checking of tyre pressures on all vehicles. Business signs on vehicle instead of Yellow Pages. I keep small works until a weekend and give the person a rate on the phone and go to do it instead of pricing and going back again.

 

One price for cash payment when work complete. (I do declare the amount and give a full Invoice) Extra increased price for direct account payment within 14 days. High price for 30 days settlement terms.

 

Avoid peak travel traffic times.

[Pedroski]

Get a food flask. When cooking at home (soup, casseroles, chilli etc) do a bit extra, microwave it in the morning and shove it in a food flask. It's amazing how a bit of proper food gets rid of the urge to waste money on crap.

Also, kelly kettle for brew up. Money up front, sure, but fresh brews are much much better than flasked ones, and the fuel is free to saves on gas/electric at home.

[Pedroski]

Oops, another one.....

Buy clothing from the likes of MandMDirect.com - The UK?s leading online discount clothing retailer You can get things like base layers, fleeces, waterproofs etc far cheaper than anywhere else.

[NI Tree]

use charity shops

[morten]

Get customer's email address and send invoices via email. Saves stamps and envelopes, gets the invoice to the customer in seconds rather than days, and saves you a trip to the mailbox.

 

In the last two years, I've sent all but four invoices by email. My invoicing system lets me send it directly, so no need to print to file and attach to email.

[NFG]

I dont run an Arb biz but a lot of the ideas here are transferable.

 

I ran a reward scheme for successfully passing on my details. fairly simplez:

 

Customer gets a card to pass on then if I got some biz from a new customer once they paid me! ie - Joe Bloggs referred me, quoting a reference from the card, then Joe got a cash-back.

 

Seemed to work quite well at the time.

 

 

Oh and for larger businesses, I think "Badgers Arse" toilet paper a fine preventative for time wasting in the bogs!

Edited December 12, 2011 by NFG

[Pedroski]

Encourage payment by internet banking - gets money into your account quicker, and funds are cleared straight away. Saves money especially if you're running in an overdraft and no having to spend money on fuel to bank cheques.

[Billy]

I got one enquiry from the yellow pages in a year.... nothing came of it. £1500 down the drain!!

 

Another idea which im unsure about, is to ask local indian take aways for unwanted cooking oil for putting in the saws. A friend who makes his own bio diesel says that because the indian takeaways only use the oil once to do popadum's its very clean!!!

Would cooking oil be any good in the saws or am i better of sticking to the 'proper stuff'?

 

The best cost cutting measure you could use is buying some of that biodiesel off your friend and runninhg your trucks and chipper on it, and your car if thats diesel too!

[Mark James]

Pay off your book keeper and do them yourself.