Purpose of a Business?

Discuss Spyderco's products and history.
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olywa
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#141

Post by olywa »

Well Sal, you appear to have scratched an itch with this question. Generated a lot of back and to initially, laid dormant for a while, got resurrected, and here we are. Lots of interesting input. Did you get out of it what you were looking for?
David R
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#142

Post by David R »

Late reply to this. Businesses exist to make money. Anything else is a nice to have. Regardless of the mission for your company, you can't fulfill it unless you are a viable business. No margin = no mission.

Some will argue that charitable organizations don't need to make money. They do. They still need to be viable as a business and therefore need to sustain themselves through revenue.

Businesses can also be a passion, which I suspect is true for Spydero. Pushing the envelop on knives and steels, figuring out how to do the best manufacturing while keeping knives affordable, using different factories all over the world. This is all great.

It takes money to keep this going. Spyderco has employees. Employees need to be paid. Employees want and need raises. For the sake of discussion, let's say everything else stayed flat (taxes, machine costs, materials cost, etc). If this happened, any company still needs growth and/or more profit margin to provide raises to their employees. And it's an ongoing cost, not a one time cost. If I have 50 employees making $60K each, that's $3M in payroll. (It's more, but ignore that for now). To give everybody a 4% raise, I need to find an extra $120K every year. Then the next year I need another $125K. Business has to keep growing just to stay flat.

The first goal of any business has to be to make money and be profitable.
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#143

Post by Brant »

Confucius said, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life”. That defines passion, a great business is where people buy into your passion and share it.
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Naperville
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#144

Post by Naperville »

The purpose of a business is to solve a problem. Usually the folks putting the business together have researched the problem and have specialized knowledge that, leads them to believe they can solve the problem for a profit, which they will either distribute, invest or give away to a targeted audience. The process of research and development of a solution that results in a business is called a business plan.
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#145

Post by T.J. »

The purpose of a business is to be profitable.
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Paraguy
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#146

Post by Paraguy »

Most would say to increase the value for its shares holders, but not Spyderco. (One reason I love them) They seem to care more about their passion for making great knives and improving the end user experience.
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Bolster
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#147

Post by Bolster »

Brant wrote:
Sun Apr 16, 2023 1:57 pm
Confucius said, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life”.

Yeah, I did that, became an artist, because I loved art. And sure enough, I was never able to find any work.

Paraguy wrote:
Mon Apr 17, 2023 8:08 pm
Most would say to increase the value for its shares holders, but not Spyderco. (One reason I love them) They seem to care more about their passion for making great knives and improving the end user experience.

....Right. Because privately held companies don't have shareholders.
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#148

Post by RustyIron »

Bolster wrote:
Mon Apr 17, 2023 8:56 pm
Yeah, I did that, became an artist, because I loved art. And sure enough, I was never able to find any work.

Right? Would you want your daughter to marry a man whose aspiration was to do what he loves? That's pretty much a recipe for a difficult life. My advice to youngsters is to find a job that earns them the most money. If it turns out they like it, then stick with it and climb the ladder. If they don't like it, then stick with it for as long as it takes to find another well-paying opportunity to try out. For what it's worth, Confucius was born into poverty. Eventually he made it to the level of mid-level government employee. That's nice.

Paraguy wrote:
Mon Apr 17, 2023 8:08 pm
Right. Because privately held companies don't have shareholders.

Doesn't matter. If a business owner doesn't respect himself enough to make a good living, then he and his product are not worthy of respect. Although it might sound cynical, my mantra is "I'm not the Sisters of Mercy." If someone doesn't respect my work to pay what it's worth, that's ok. They can go elsewhere.

The original question was "What's the purpose of a business?" It's an easy question. The answer is to "Make profit for the owner, and to make it possible for employees to earn a living." If it's not doing that, it's a hobby, a charity, a scam, a foolish endeavor.
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#149

Post by Brant »

Bolster wrote:
Mon Apr 17, 2023 8:56 pm
Brant wrote:
Sun Apr 16, 2023 1:57 pm
Confucius said, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life”.

Yeah, I did that, became an artist, because I loved art. And sure enough, I was never able to find any work.

There is also that thing we call “Luck” or “Right place at the right time”. Not many of us have had this all line up.
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#150

Post by Bolster »

Brant wrote:
Tue Apr 18, 2023 6:32 pm
There is also that thing we call “Luck” or “Right place at the right time”. Not many of us have had this all line up.

True, and don't feel sorry for me, I'm not actually an unemployed artist. I just saw an opportunity to be a smart arse.
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#151

Post by awa54 »

electro-static wrote:
Sun Mar 19, 2023 2:05 am

Both my parents founded successful businesses, and i think you hit on something important. People working for that business need to be invested in it’s success. Which is achieved through respect, reward, and investment in worker’s well Being. I have worked for good and bad startups and have managed people in both and the key component was respect, listening, and a willingness to be patient and teach people why we do things the way we do, and to at least listen when they think we can do better. looking out for your people, is critical business sense to me.

I gotta disagree about the younger generation and the “get woke go broke” thing.

I think young people have it harder in so far that they aren’t given reasonable expectations before entering the workplace, and often aren’t given sufficient guidance, mentorship, or compensation once they do, my first experience was that i was thrown i to a role with not only no training, but my supervisor training me wrong to do the job he wanted me to do, I had to teach myself to do things right independently and seek out mentorship outside official channels to become a skillful worker. You can’t even rent an apartment on most starting wages these days, that ain’t an easy way to start your career. Quite simply for most young people mentorship and training is dead.

Moving further into my career I also find that respecting diversity and making sure that different people from different cultures are comfortable and feel respected in the workplace lets me get the best ideas and productivity out of them, and advocating for them lets them preform harder because they own their achievements. I find particularly women my field are given both 50% more work and 50% less credit unless they either advocate way hard for themselves or their supervisor advocates for them.

Folks don’t “quite quit” when they feel respected through compensation or simply taking their ideas seriously and challenging them to grow as professionals by providing new skills and training. It’s lost on the modern “everyone is disposable” managment culture, but building a solid team that works hard for each other matters. I just wish more people had a chance to experience it, i’ve seen so many bright motivated workers get crushed by indifferent supervisors who are content to pile as much work as humanly possible on them, and co-workers who avoid new responsibilities because they fear the same fate.

People want to work hard when they know they won’t be punished or taken advantage of for it.

A good business understands that it is in-fact made of the people who work there, and that hard work and respect is a two way street. You are the sum of the people who do the work, not your IP, or you C-Suit.

You don’t respect your workers: they leave. They don’t respect you: you find new ones.

You expressed many of my deeply held beliefs about the workplace in this post, thank you!
I think I'd be glad to have you as a manager :grin-big eyes
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Paraguy
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Re: Purpose of a Business?

#152

Post by Paraguy »

Bolster wrote:
Mon Apr 17, 2023 8:56 pm
Brant wrote:
Sun Apr 16, 2023 1:57 pm
Confucius said, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life”.

Yeah, I did that, became an artist, because I loved art. And sure enough, I was never able to find any work.

Paraguy wrote:
Mon Apr 17, 2023 8:08 pm
Most would say to increase the value for its shares holders, but not Spyderco. (One reason I love them) They seem to care more about their passion for making great knives and improving the end user experience.

....Right. Because privately held companies don't have shareholders.
They have less. There are still people who own shares of private companies
"Some call me...Tim?"
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