Browsing Tag

Junkyard Management

Junkyard Negotiation

Every interaction at a junkyard ultimately comes down to who pays for the donuts or who eats the most donuts. Okay, so not really, but almost all conversation involves some kind of negotiation or competition. Of course this is true in most business settings. Or anywhere people exist for that matter.

There are the obvious negotiations that all businesses have: price, terms, salaries, and of course how many donuts it takes to appease the boss. There are also the usual competitions, from who has the highest sales in a given day to who can dismantle the most parts in an …

Family, Goble Properties, Junkyard Management,

Taking Good Solutions Too Far

My father built a mobile home park in the early 1970’s. Seemed like a good idea at the time — the land was cheap, the location was near a lot of blue collar jobs, and construction costs were minimal.

But he had a hard time getting anybody to move into the park.

He found a solution by buying mobile homes from the factory and moving them into the park himself. Then he’d sell the mobile home all ready to go. The buyer didn’t have to deal with permits, utilities, setup, transportation, etc. The park began to fill up this way …

Goble Properties, Junkyard Management,

The Wisdom of Walt

Walt turned 98 last month. He’s the oldest employee at Goble Properties. Yes, he really is on our payroll, and he really does show up for work. Not a full forty hours a week, but he’s still on call whenever we need an old school solution to a problem.

My father hired Walt nearly 40-years ago to do some maintenance work. Nobody has worked harder for the family company since then. And nobody knows how to fix things — anything — like Walt.

The hardest I ever worked was the summer I poured concrete with Walt at our family ranch. …

Goble Properties, Junkyard Management, Random Thoughts,

Competition

I’ve been thinking a lot about competition lately. We compete in business, politics, global affairs, sports, and even in many personal pursuits (I know people who live in angst because they have fewer twitter followers than a competitor). Competition can be good because it can bring out the best in us, but other times it can be ugly and harmful. The trick is knowing how to manage our competitive instincts.

One easy junkyard tip to share on this is to first identify who your competition is.

A recent conversation had me thinking about how our competitive natures can interfere with …