Case Studies
Issue No. 19 - October/November 2004
Wall Buddies
tactical craft
The Wall Buddies concept was set up in 1988 from a home garage, selling a small range of three-dimensional characters mainly to decorate children's bedrooms. The company grew by distributing its products to agency points around Australia, with resellers operating teams of consultants who sold Wall Buddies in a 'Party Plan' format.
Bill Leo bought Wall Buddies two years ago, and he’s busy changing all that.
Wall Buddies now has a national sales and marketing department headed up by Sandy McCulloch that co-ordinates all consultant sales activities, promotions, recruitment and training.
"This has given us far greater control over the sales activities versus having six agent distribution points feeding the information down the line," Bill says. "Under the manufacturing-agency structure, we never had the opportunity to understand who our sales force were, or what motivated them to sell our product, let alone try and learn more about our customers."
"Around four years ago there were about 300 consultants registered to sell our product. When we restructured and brought the sales activity 'in house', we realised that the 300 consultants all worked at varying levels making it impossible to forecast sales for production purposes.
"Over the past two years, we have happily reduced the number of consultants to a manageable core of 60 active sellers – it's a starting point. We can now forecast regular sales and production levels to manage the business efficiently.
"More interestingly, our in-house sales and marketing department working closely one-on-one with the consultants, are generating the same turnover as 300 Consultants were four years ago!"
The timely restructure is taking effect now, with the company poised for growth. Wall Buddies has sought core consultants’ feedback for improvements and new product designs. The range has diversified from children's bedroom designs to interior and ext...
