SMALL FAMILY BUSINESS
GlassKing Distributor
Company
“Those honchos at headquarters keep coming up with rosy sales projections and glow-
ing strategic plans,”lamented Marilyn Green. “Don’t they know our entire distribu-
tion effort is in the hands of family businesses?”As director of dealer development for
GlassKing, a major supplier, Marilyn seems to be spending more time coping with
family infighting than she does on new product launches or gaining market share.
Each year, the concerns of her distributors—most of them independently owned
Lately, the consequences of unresolved family problems have hit GlassKing’s bot-
tom line harder than in the past. Marilyn first noticed complacency among dealers at
an annual sales meeting five years ago. They were a little grayer, a little heavier, and
clearly less enthusiastic about rapid growth. “They’ve peaked,”she recalls thinking,
“and where are all the young people?”
Marilyn remembers when these owners were the best in the business. Now, faced
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