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January/February 2017 3 www.feda.com C O V E R S T O R Y January/February 2017 F E A T U R E S 4 President's Message "It's Not Always Easy to do the Right Thing" 6 Industry Insights "Musings from the Flying Metal Tube--Again" Gary Licht, EQUIPEX LLC 8 Association Highlights "Strategic Listening Campaign Pays Off" COMMITTING TO CUSTOMER SERVICE IN 2017 Start with these six goals to encourage loyalty from your base. I will put customers at the center of my business. I will focus on what I can do, not what I can't. I will seek fi rst to understand. I will look my customers in the eye. I will think outside the box when solving customer issues. I will put myself in the shoes of my customer. 14 Three New Year's Resolutions for Better Inventory Control It's not about a Quick Fix, It's about Committing to Change, Says Inventory Specialist Jon Schreibfeder 16 Use These Time-Saving Tech Tools for Your Salespeople From Your Nerdy Best Friend Beth Z 22 Four Case Studies in Gross Margin Enhancement Consider These to Help Renew Your Focus 24 What's on Your Calendar? Practical Tips to Jump-Start Personal Development 32 Cutting Through the Red Tape How to Build a Resource Library to Help Your Customers with Codes and Other Essentials from Foster Frable Your Guide to the 2017 FEDA Convention Best-Selling Author Daniel Pink on "How Smart Companies are Rethinking Innova- tion" and much more…. Don't forget your FEDA Convention brochure insert for the complete schedule of speakers, workshops and social activities. D E P A R T M E N T S 10 Asking the Right Questions Increasing profi tability and performance has a lot to do with the questions you're not asking, says consultant Alan Anders- en. Find out the three he uses to assess weaknesses in a company's organiza- tional health—and how The Boelter Companies revolutionized its brand by adopting the servant-leadership model.