I’ve closely studied two recent auctions of screw machines and ancillary equipment – Anderson Fittings in Chicago and MTTM in the Twin Cities last week – for indications of market strength and customer preferences. This is not just “inside baseball” for people in the trade. These auctions, which from all appearances were actually honest sales with no observable price pumping (I tend to be cynical about this stuff), tell a clear story about the turned parts market, at least for the multi-spindle niche. The buyers generally do not need more capacity. They have more than enough spindles turning. At the Anderson auction,…
Author: Lloyd Graff
Tim Haendle was pleased with himself when I talked to him Wednesday. He had bought 100 carbide inserts – used of course – for a hundred bucks at a Hoff Online Auctions Internet sale of a screw machine shop in St. Paul, Minnesota. He’ll regrind them for use on one of the 22 National Acmes he runs in his shop, buried in a forest in Mendocino County, 125 miles north of San Francisco. Tim is a customer of Graff-Pinkert, of sorts. He is a rugged individualist determined to live life and do business his own way. I never make any…
I love the used machinery business because it is a competitive treasure hunt every day. It asks us for impossible calculations about realizable values for illiquid, flawed, sometimes rickety, filthy objects that often have little tangible worth when we are asked to buy them. Here’s an example of the type of situation we consider at my company Graff-Pinkert every day. A firm has a 25-year-old screw machine or rotary transfer machine that it does not need at the moment. It has long been written off the financial statements, yet the potential seller feels it still has value but doesn’t know…
So many nights I go home discouraged and numb, with the sickening feeling that I accomplished nothing and wasted my workday reading emails and contemplating my navel. Recently, I read an article on productivity in business today. The piece decried the decline of work quality because of email, texting, Facebook and time-wasting games like Words with Friends. Technology has become an office curse and I see a trend in crackdowns to curb the time wasters. I am working on my own habits to combat my personal drift. What I have found to be most useful is preparing an agenda for…
Sometimes the line written for a laugh rings true as a bell. The most recent Dos Equis beer ad ends with, “he gave his father ‘the talk.’” I heard the line and chuckled. A few hours later, my children gave me “the talk.” We were on our annual family vacation in San Diego last week – the whole mishpacha (family) in adjoining condos, eating, playing, needling, sharing the vibe. My grandchildren had puzzles and projects everywhere. The beautiful disarray of a family that loves being together – at least in small doses – filled the space with joyful chaos. Earlier…
Martin is so skilled at waterskiing he seldom uses the skis anymore. He prefers the challenge of barefoot skiing on Lake Hopatcong that hugs his summer residence in New Jersey. Martin is my wife Risa’s first cousin, so I’ve known him for over 40 years. At every family event we played basketball against each other. We’d bang each other around on the court (he played for the North, I always played for the South) and then adjourn for the banter. If there was an injury Martin would take over using his medical training to aid and comfort the hobbled participant.…
A few observations from the 2013 Precision Machining Technology Show (PMTS) in Columbus. 1) Attendance at shows is dwindling, which does not mean PMTS was a weak event for those who attended. The third day was a bust for counting attendees, but a great time for exhibitors to walk the floor and touch their peers. I think this has become an important aspect of smaller shows – the chance for the community of vendors to share stories and swap ideas. The machining world is a shockingly close community of buyers, sellers, and producers. The willingness of machining folk to share…
I have an unusual vantage point to observe the housing market as the pundits fret about the housing “bubble” they imagine is bulging. I live in a housing refrigerator, Olympia Fields, Illinois. I bought my 3,000 square foot home 34 years ago on a half acre lot within walking distance of the Olympia Fields Country Club, where they played the 2003 U.S. Open golf tournament. There are five beautiful country club courses within a seven minute drive. The suburb is on the Metra train line so I can get downtown in 35 minutes, and I’m five minutes from the interstate.…
One of the good things about buying out my brother at Graff-Pinkert was being asked by lenders to study my costs. What I found out, among other things, was that direct labor costs in the shop comprised a small percentage of my cost of sales, even though we refurbish many of the machines we sell. But the competitive advantage of selling a superior product compared to our competitors (excuse the advertising) is our expertise in upgrading the flawed used machinery. I concluded that I needed to protect this advantage and expand on it. I raised all of our key employees’…
I wrote a blog recently about my reaction to a letter from my landscaper Guillermo’s daughter, which put a face on her father to his clients. I received two comments asking why Guillermo’s daughter wrote the letter. I didn’t answer for a few reasons. First, I don’t know why the letter was written. Ostensibly it was to announce that Guillermo was again taking a week off so his clients should not expect him to come and mow the lawn. But after a friend queried me on the topic yesterday, I started thinking more about the issue and my own response. I am…