Case Study: Company A (Baton Rouge, Louisiana)

Starting Point: What Was Breaking

• Working from kitchen table an living room was interfering with family life and did not provide enough room for staff.
• Owner interruption overload, including frequent phone calls while trying to complete admin work.
• Low-dollar jobs consuming capacity, including analysis of 122 jobs at $100 or less and the related profit impact.
• Decision fatigue around pricing and delivery, with recurring discussions about minimums and service boundaries.
• Billing and deposit friction, including multi-step deposit invoicing and partial payment handling.
• Gaps in transaction clarity, including concern about duplicate charging and suspense totals.

Objectives for the Engagement

• Improve revenue to afford business workshop.
• Increase profit per hour by establishing minimum standards that protect capacity.
• Improve cash collection reliability through consistent deposit and invoice handling.
• Reduce owner dependency through role clarity and SOP-based execution.
• Improve execution reliability through repeatable customer communication and handoff workflows.

What I Changed: The Interventions

Operating Cadence and Accountability

• Defined SOP follow-through as a management standard, including consequences when SOPs are ignored.
• Aligned responsibilities through “who does what” clarity so ownership boundaries were explicit.

Financial Visibility and Decision Support

• Reviewed profit and loss and transaction details to identify possible double charging and reconcile suspicious totals.
• Implemented deposit language and handling rules, including a 50% deposit expectation for near-term events.
• Standardized payment attribution steps, including marking payments correctly when received via Venmo.

Sales Follow-Up and Pipeline Discipline

• Reduced intake friction by directing customers into a clearer website and form-based flow during peak workload.
• Introduced price anchoring as a quoting method to protect margin and discourage misfit requests.

Process, Tools, and Delivery Systems

• Set a delivery eligibility minimum requiring $125 of product, and reinforced that pickup timing is arranged by the business.
• Built “new customer account instructions” and simplified deposit and invoice steps to reduce rework.
• Updated website and email components, including removing unwanted sidebars and adjusting templates.

Outcomes

The outcomes reflect a shift from ad hoc decisions to repeatable operating rules. Deposit and delivery standards reduced back-and-forth and protected schedule capacity. Billing workflow cleanup improved confidence in the numbers and reduced operational rework, which supported more consistent execution as volume increased.

Timeline of Key Moments

• November 17, 2020 – Reviewed the impact of low-dollar jobs, including 122 jobs at $100 or less and the related profit implications.
• December 22, 2020 – Captured deposit language, including 50% due when events are within eight weeks.
• January 1, 2021 – Moved to new 5,000 sqft facility and increased staff to 10 people.
• January 5, 2021 – Reviewed reconciliation concerns, including suspense report totals and possible double charging.
• March 16, 2021 – Reinforced a $125 delivery eligibility minimum and discussed deposit workflow mechanics.
• March 23, 2021 – Built and refined “new customer account instructions” and adjusted invoice and estimate steps.
• March 30, 2021 – Confirmed monthly sales reached $30,000 by end of month.
• April 6, 2021 – Adjusted check-in and lead capture workflow after switching systems.
• June 9, 2021 – Continued operational support tied to shop operations and content activity.

Why This Worked

The engagement focused on reducing tool and workflow friction at the exact points where work stalled: quoting, deposit collection, delivery rules, and internal handoffs. Minimum standards turned recurring debates into defaults, which reduced decision fatigue and protected calendar capacity.

Follow-through improved when steps were made explicit. When invoices, deposits, and payments are handled the same way each time, the Owner can make faster decisions with fewer surprises. Reinforcing SOP adherence and clarifying who owns each step reduced dependence on the Owner for everyday execution.

Transferable Value

• Operational diagnostics focused on margin, capacity, and execution reliability.
• Minimum standards design for pricing, deposits, and delivery policies.
• Billing and payment workflow cleanup to improve revenue visibility.
• SOP creation and reinforcement for training and consistent execution.
• Role clarity and accountability loops that reduce missed handoffs.
• Tooling and workflow simplification across website, booking, and invoicing.
• Capacity planning conversations tied to workload tradeoffs and owner bandwidth.