Issue: December 2024

Remember When Al Gore Invented the Internet?

By
From Agency Sales, July 2005.
The same year that Al Gore won the Webby Lifetime Achievement Award.

I’m glad he did, because I’ve been building websites ever since! MANA is re‑launching our website on January 1st 2025. It’s not just a website, but a re‑invigorated platform in which MANA fulfills its mission to its members.

Benefits of the Updated Website

  • Members will get more qualified opportunities.
  • New manufacturer members will be coached on how to work with reps before they join.
  • All new members will be properly onboarded before joining.
  • Reps will be able to find other rep partners with the new SubRepFinder®.
  • Learning resources will be reformatted and reorganized.
  • Member profiles will truly reflect the business goals that are pursued.
  • Easier access to all of the new MANA benefits and programs.
  • Retired members will have honorary access to stay engaged with MANA.
  • The site will attract new members to the rep profession.

Operational Updates

  • An onboarding fee will be charged for all new members that seek to join MANA. Existing MANA members are grandfathered-in.
  • Starting in 2025, if any membership lapses more than six months, the member will be considered a new member and the onboarding fee applies even if they were previously grandfathered-in.
  • Dues payments will be made by credit card or bank ACH only, with a discount for auto-pay.
  • The monthly membership dues program will end. All dues will be paid on an annual basis. A scholarship program will be implemented to help out new rep firms.
  • MANA is amicably parting ways with eight sister associations whose members receive access to MANA resources. We welcome the affected reps and agencies to re-join as a full-time member.

What are the next steps? You will get the most value out of your membership by interacting with the association: Log in to update your profile, use the learning resources provided, take advantage of new programs, and provide feedback. On that last point, let’s have a conversation at MANAfest 2025. You read it here first. The large gathering of MANA members, known as MANAfest, is returning! Registration opens on the new and improved www.MANAonline.org on January 1, 2025.

MANA and Mentorship — The Ripple Effect

By
© vipman4 | stock.adobe.com

To those of you reading this, I will begin with a brief apology: I’m sorry, but I have purposely chosen an already-covered topic. Despite its being six months later, I could not let Charley Cohon’s retirement go by without some kind of acknowledgment. In addition to all that he did for MANA (see VP/GM Jerry Leth’s June 2024 article for a start), I find myself compelled to share a more individual perspective. I can’t even begin to guess where my rep firm (MARN, Inc.) or I would be had I never known him; his influence was … Read the rest

MacKellar: 100 Years and Counting

By
photo of Andrew MacKellar
Andrew MacKellar, fouth generation, took over as CEO this year.

Before any discussion takes place of MacKellar Associates, Rochester Hills, Michigan, here are some challenging — if not daunting — facts about family-owned businesses:

  • According to the Harvard Business Review, approximately 70 percent of family-owned businesses won’t make it to a second generation.
  • Only 30 percent of family businesses survive the transition from first- to second-generation ownership.
  • Just 12 percent survive the transition from second to third generation. Only 13 percent of family businesses remain in the family more than 60 years.
  • And, 47 percent of family business owners expecting
… Read the rest

AI and the Rep

By
© AndSus | stock.adobe.com

If anything captured the tone of a discussion during a MANAchat devoted to artificial intelligence and ChatGPT it’s probably the words of one rep who’s just begun using these technological tools who maintained, “I feel like I’m the guy who just discovered fire.”

Those words perfectly describe the experiences of many who are fairly new to the possibilities, benefits, pitfalls, and dangers of this new technology.

For those uninitiated to the subject of this MANAchat conducted over three days early this fall, the subjects are well defined as follows by Barbara McQuade in her book Attack … Read the rest

Rep Serves Unique Niche

By

Several years ago a MANA member was quoted in these pages as saying, “The popular misconception concerning independent reps is that all they have to do is make calls and follow up.” If there’s any putting that belief to rest, it’s in the practice of Jo-Ann Hernandez, who heads the Princeton, Massachusetts-based Business Lazo.

Hernandez and her agency were profiled in the January 2024 issue of Agency Sales magazine. While that profile focused on the operations and philosophy of her agency, what it didn’t mention was some of the unique product lines that she represents, and that’s where we learn … Read the rest

Managing the Sales Process

By
© starserfer | stock.adobe.com

Somebody has to be the boss. Democracy is the enemy of the sales business.

Someone has to be in charge.

That simple-sounding statement can lead to all sorts of problems in the rep business.

Who should manage the sales force? In a rep environment, picking someone to be in charge of the sales process and to work with the salespeople to get the results that principals are expecting is critical. But how does a rep firm with perhaps four partners and five outside salespeople determine how to run the sales programs and deliver results for principals?… Read the rest

Managing Secondary Principals Profitably

By
© 1st footage | stock.adobe.com

For an independent manufacturers’ representative agency to operate profitably there needs to be a balance between the primary and secondary group of principals. The primary group is composed of manufacturers that normally account for 75 to 80 percent of total sales and profits and the secondary group accounts for the balance.

Although the primary group does not change often, you can expect the secondary group to be adjusted often during a career. Occasionally a secondary principal can be developed and grow to become one of the primary principals. Never discount the value of any of … Read the rest

Message to Our Sister Association Members

MANA is charting a new path in 2025 and beyond. MANA is amicably parting ways with eight sister associations whose members receive access to MANA resources. The affected associations are AIM/R, EFC‑CEMRA, MEMA (HDMRC), HIRA, ISA, IHA, NMRA and PTRA.

MANA’s mission is to support independent manufacturers’ representatives and the manufacturers who choose to go to market through reps. We welcome all of the affected reps and agencies to rejoin MANA as a full-time member.

We are reprinting an article from April 2005 Agency Sales magazine which discusses the strategic importance of dual association membership for independent sales representatives. It advocates … Read the rest

The Benefits of Dual-Association Membership for Reps

Originally published April 2005. Minor updates and revisions included below.

How does one place a value on membership in a professional association? More to the point, how do you place a value on membership in an independent representatives’ association? Is it a cost? An investment?
Is it worth the time, money and effort to not only pay annual dues but then to follow up and become actively involved in the workings of the organization? And finally, what has your association done for you lately?

© Vectorvstocker | stock.adobe.com

The answers to these questions will probably vary depending upon whom you ask. … Read the rest

Develop, Motivate and Retain Your Employees

By
© Liubomir | stock.adobe.com

Why do people leave their jobs? Even if they are well paid and have good benefits, many will wave goodbye as they walk out the door, never to return.

They don’t leave because they want more money or better benefits. They don’t leave because they don’t like their jobs or their coworkers. They leave because their managers and supervisors are not coaching, nurturing, recognizing or motivating them.

Fifty percent of responders in a Gallup Employee Engagement Survey of employees in the United States said that, at some point in their careers, they have left to get away … Read the rest

MANA Recognizes Members’ Milestone Anniversary Dates

Each year MANA recognizes members who are celebrating special anniversaries of their MANA memberships. In this issue we recognize members who are celebrating 75, 65, 60, 55, 50, 45, 40, 35, 30 or 25 years of MANA membership.

MANA thanks and congratulates these members for their long-term support
and commitment to MANA and our industry.

We also thank those long-term members whose membership anniversaries are not among the years listed in this issue. Your company name was either published within the past three years or will be published within the next two.

Representative Members
75 Years

Darin Dankelson
Metal Parts … Read the rest

Listening to the Needs of Reps

By
© PureSolution | stock.adobe.com

One manufacturer learned about the pitfalls of offering the same marketing/promotion programs to all of its reps. “Thankfully, we’ve always been pretty good about listening to what our reps tell us. We began to get an earful from several of them when they complained about how we were rolling out some marketing plans. While we had done a great deal of preparation for the program, to be perfectly honest, we didn’t do what we should have in terms of getting their advice.

“As a result, we shouldn’t have been overly surprised when we didn’t get the … Read the rest

The Corporate Transparency Act and the Responsibility of Business Owners

By and and
© sebra | stock.adobe.com

By now, sales representatives operating through their business entities have heard of the Corporate Transparency Act and its compliance requirements. For many business owners, the deadlines for submitting the required reports under the Act are fast approaching. So, what is the Corporate Transparency Act and how does it impact the sales representatives operating through their own corporations, limited liability companies and other similar business organizations? This article will examine the Corporate Transparency Act and its compliance requirements and timelines.

The Corporate Transparency Act

The Corporate Transparency Act (“CTA”), effective as of January 1, 2024, provides law enforcement … Read the rest