editor’s forum Facing Facts, Fixing Faults
We knew the industry awards process needed changing, so we turned to the experts. You.
SOLOMON DANIELS EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
SDANIELS@ME-MAG.COM
ou often hear the term, “Talk is cheap.” This day, in 2013, I dare- say the phrase is not only obsolete; it’s flat-out wrong. Sure, its spirit refers to the value of action over words, but if you take a step back and put it into a broader context—communication—then you see a marked difference. The ability to pass information from one person to another is the basis for how most of our businesses are built. “Word of mouth” is always the answer I get when I interview a storeowner about how he mainly acquires customers. Yeah, I’m pontificating a bit, but I wanted to give
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my point a little perspective. When we began pre- paring for the Industry Awards last year, we were faced with a resource that was not around when we first laid out this format. Facebook allowed us to reach out to many of you to keep you informed on the process and progress. But it also served as a po- tent forum for many of you to voice your opinions on how the process was run, and many industry professionals took full advantage of this last year. Your opinions brought to light an issue that had been creeping up on us: The industry had changed,
We solicited you for your ideas on specific points in the awards process, and merged your voice with ours to create a format that takes advantage of this new industry with new communications tools.
and we, the people who were responsible for using the awards to highlight the best our industry had to offer, had not made the necessary adjustments to change with it. This, of course, does not take away from the honorees who have graced the stage at Knowledge- Fest the past couple of years to receive the indus- try’s highest honors. Our Retailers of the Year and Installers of the Year have all been great ambassa- dors, and since their awards, they have become even better helpers and advisors to their peers. I couldn’t be more proud of seeing humble guys like Jon Webb and Jeremy Carlson come out of their shops and out of their shells to share the mettle of their talents, and seeing strivers like Parish Tanner and Micah Wil- liams define themselves with an award that was not an end to a journey, but a validation of their efforts. But still, things needed changing. Our reps, in
trying to keep up with constantly changing vendor strategies and new product categories, did not have the time to be as active or selective in determining our best to start off the awards. Some of the rules which were relevant in 2003 and 2004 didn’t fit as well or simply didn’t apply today. The proportion of chain sizes had shifted down from where it was, so single stores and small chains mostly dominated the specialist industry. And retailers no longer came in one “brick-and-mortar” flavor: Dedicated specialists who took care of customers from non-traditional but fully licensed locations were excluded. As you may have already seen, that changed this
year. We solicited you for your ideas on specific points in the awards process, and merged your voice with ours to create a format that takes advantage of this new industry with new communications tools. Retailers and installers can now nominate themselves to avoid having deserving individuals slip through the cracks. Smartphone video cam- eras provide everyone the ability to show us their stores, operations and personalities to give us a true picture of your passion for the industry. And new categories for retail store sizes better represent the landscape that is our industry today. But in the process, I was happy to see that many of you didn’t want to give up on certain things that communication and technology advances could have no doubt made easier. Principal among these was the process of submitting materials to be judged for Retailer of the Year and Installer of the Year. It’s been suggested in the past that it would be easier to convert to electronic submissions of these materials. But overwhelmingly, most of you said the process should be hard, time consuming, and a little costly. It represents the effort and sacrifice it takes to get to the top of your field, and there are no easy days or shortcuts in that climb. I’m also happy because it’s the only way I get a
great selection of industry T-shirts to wear all year! So, while I sincerely wish the best of luck to
everyone who’s participating this year, and I hope that the awards you receive, no matter the level, give you a marketing tool to grow your business, I also congratulate you. Your voice has made these your awards, and no doubt, all of our continued interaction and collaboration will help these awards dynamically represent who we are as an industry. The Industry Awards will continue to do what they were meant to do: give us the people and businesses we want to aspire to be. µ
8 Mobile Electronics May—June 2013
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