Been quite a while since I've been on our blog. I haven't been active on ScootDawg much in the last 6-9 mos either. We've learned a lot in the last 18-20 mos (since we last posted) and can provide some interesting reading (all opinion of course) to those who would want to check it out.
The last four months have been very grueling for us here at Bandit MotorSports. As soon as the turmoil hit the financial markets in Sept and Oct, we were hit with ever slumping sales. We held out in Dec to see if there would be the usual pick-up in sales before Christmas but nothing happened. We were in a major 'rut'. Our expenses (overhead) exceeded our income and we had to make a move or fail as a business. We elected to move to a smaller facility with much less overhead - and try to concentrate on our internet business a little more by broadening the product offering into off-road vehicles and doing some extensive SEO to keep our website high in the search engines. I actually feel that we will have a good year even with the economy being the worst its been in some years ... simply because of the reduction in our operating costs.
The coming months will tell us much about what our 2009 season will be like. We've been having steady customer calls and e-mails - everyone doing their shopping - as people get their tax refunds. From some of our cusomter feedback we gather that many are going to use their refunds to 'stimulate' the economy and buy themselves a 'toy'. While we would love their business, we believe that it's important for consumers to realize that we (all of us) need to start consuming again. We can't rely on our government(s) to bail us out of this situation. Most of it comes to us buying things and consuming as we used to. That may be the real question though - will we ever consume at the level we did just 2 years ago?
One thing I do know for sure though, people are saving their money instead of spending, which is good except in times like these when consumption is going to save our butts. I fear that the general population doesn't understand this clearly and that we will fall into another 'depression'. It's possible, don't think it's not. The less we spend, the more troubled the economy will become, which in turn causes us to spend less and save more - which causes the economy to faulter even further. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy... and if you've been paying attention, it's basically been playing out for the last 4-6 months...
Well, enough with the bad stuff. Here at Bandit Motorsports, we are truly looking forward to a good year of sales and profits, and doin our parts as consumers to help 'bail us all out'. We hope many of you are on board with us... and we'll be tryin to post more often as things develop...
Later, Jim J...
