A Nimble Competitor Succeeds

Jim Biggs, president of Enforcer Products Inc. was sure the hotel staff had set up way too many chairs for the company’s annual sales meeting in December.

“I couldn’t believe how many chairs were in that room,” said Biggs. “I remember when we met in a Cartersville motel room with seven chairs.” In fact, there were about 130 sales representatives and staffers at the December meeting.

In the past three years, Enforcer has almost doubled its sales to about $100 million and has quadrupled its work force to about 200 employees.

Enforcer is based in Cartersville, Ga., a small town outside Atlanta. The company, which sells about 100 insecticides and household cleaning and maintenance products, has stuck by the offbeat management structure it set up from the beginning. By not emphasizing titles and rotating the presidency, it takes an ego-free approach to managing the business. Founder Wayne Biasetti and marketing whiz Jim Biggs take turns serving as president every few years. Chief financial officer and partner Ed Brush keeps an eye on the money and computer operations, but he also plays a major role in the marketing decisions.

“If you are having a bad day, chances are your partners are not, so the company can still enjoy having an owner that’s positive and productive,” said Biasetti, who founded the company in 1977.

Although Biasetti has an MBA, he realized that in order to be successful he needed to find partners with strengths to balance his weaknesses.

“Typically, a marketing man is not that great with money, and a money man is not that great with marketing--and a manufacturing man is a whole other animal,” said Biasetti, who is primarily responsible for manufacturing operations and currently holds the title of chief executive.

Biasetti said he and his entrepreneurial partners still enjoy working together despite the challenges posed by skyrocketing sales. To cope with the growth, they divided employees into eight teams that focus on different product areas. They also freed their six regional sales managers from daily selling responsibilities to better manage the 100-plus sales representatives around the United States.

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Enforcer often beats its much larger corporate competition by being able to bring products to market fast. It also encourages sales people, vendors, raw material suppliers and customers to come up with the new product ideas.

In fact, a new household ant barrier designed to be sprinkled around the perimeter of the home was the brainchild of a new salesman who had been trying to sell the idea to his former company for years. His new bosses at Enforcer liked the idea so much that the company only took about 45 days to develop and put the product on the market.

“You can’t believe the passion he (the salesman) has for this product,” said Jim Biggs, president and marketing chief. “Just about every product we have comes from the sales people.”

When sales representatives told Biggs that potpourri scent was gaining popularity among consumers, Enforcer raced to create a line of flower-scented products. The company also packaged them in lavender-colored boxes rather than its traditional bright red packages.

“We can probably bring out a retail product faster than anyone else around,” said Brush. “We have no ego problems. Once we get behind something, we can move forward very quickly.”

The company also looks to its vendors and chemical suppliers for product ideas. The company’s new hair-dissolving bathroom drain opener uses the same chemicals that are in cream hair removers popular among women.

“We gambled that women would recognize the smell of the chemical and realize how it works,” said Biasetti.

Enforcer segments the market and boosts sales by producing different products for different jobs. For instance, it sells a drain opener specifically for kitchen sinks and an enzyme product designed to help septic tanks function better. A recent hit, at least among the company’s owners, is a flea trap that traps fleas on a sticky surface mounted behind a plug-in night light.

They attribute their growth in part to the fact that their products are mostly nontoxic and are not dangerous to people, animals or the environment.

“Our all-time winner caught 1,700 fleas in one night and sent them back to us,” said Biasetti. “It was disgustingly successful.”

When they are not counting fleas, the partners are figuring out ways to make the company grow. Brush said Enforcer changed banks two years ago because their banker was too conservative and unwilling to fund the growth. Today, Brush said his banker at Trust Co. in Atlanta is eager to help the company grow and expand with new buildings and new people. Enforcer, which occupies a quarter-mile-long building on 12 acres, is adding new warehouse space every year.

Biggs, the marketing chief, predicts that the privately held company will double in size and sales again in four to five years. “We constantly find more good sales people and more good products,” he said. “We’d also like to buy existing product lines.”

Has Enforcer’s enormous success changed the partners?

“We are all basically the same,” said Biggs. “We’ve added a few thing to our homes but we still drive trucks, not fancy cars.”