Carlson Company

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Carlson Company

History

Carlson Company was founded in 1938 as a Gold Bond Stamp Company by Curt Carlson. He started the company with a loan of fifty-five dollars (Funding Universe, 2012). When Carlson created the company, there was an economic crisis in the company. In the beginning, Carlson started the company as a Gold Bond Stamp where consumers would trade their consumer loyalty programs for the provision of consumer incentives for grocery stores. The Gold Bond stamps acted as incentives in many stores. They could attract many incentives and they could be replaced with many merchandise. Carlson was the largest supplier of mink coats where he used to exchange them with the stamps (Funding Universe, 2012).

However, in 1960, the country economy started to grow as the Gold Bond Stamp started becoming unpopular. For this reason, Carlson had to change his line of business for the purposes of keeping up with the current trends. In 1973, Carlson changed the line of business to hospitality, travel industry and corporate incentives (Funding Universe, 2012). Additionally, he changed the company name to Carlson Companies Inc. before which, in 1963, he had purchased Radisson Hotel in Minneapolis. After changing the name, the company purchased T.G.I. Friday’s in 1975 and County Kitchen International in 1977 (Funding Universe, 2012).

Acquisitions of the Company

Carlson businesses range from hotels, restaurants and travels. Carlson Company begun with Radisson hotel, which was acquired in 1963 and later the company continued to spread the hotel chains to other part of the state. T.G.I Restaurant was acquired in 1973 as part of the restaurant business. In 1994, Carlson Travel Group singed a contract with Wagonlit to merge. They formed a company and named it Carlson Wagonlit Travel. In 2000, Carlson Hotels bought the Park Plaza Hotels & Resort to add to their Brands (Bloomberg Business week 2012).

Company Culture

According to the different employees of the company, the culture of Carlson Company was developed by Carlson himself who made the employees see their worth while they were working. This motivation has continued for many decades since the company was created and the employees of the company are respected for the work they are doing. On the other hand, Carlson made it the culture of the company to acquire other hotels and make them Carlson Company brands. These cultures have led to the successful growth of the business for the past decades since it was created.

Purposes of the Business

The main purposes of the company are in the hotel, restaurant and travel industry. However, the company begun as a Gold Stamp but it progressed to become a hotel, restaurant and travel industry. Over the years, the company has been able to purchase other hotel brands, merge with other companies in the hotel, restaurant and travel industry. Therefore, based on the business that is owned by Carlson Company Inc, its main purpose are in the hospitality industry.

Family Members Working in the Company

Several members of Carlson family who have worked and some are still working in the family business of Carlson Company Inc. the first member is Curt Carlson. Carlson was the founder of Carlson Company and has been at the helm of leadership of the company until his death in 1999. The other member of the family who has worked for the company is Marilyn Carlson Nelson. She is the daughter of Curt Carlson. She is currently the Chairperson of Carlson Companies, before which she was the Chief Executive Officer of the Company. When her father died, he named her as the successor (Nelson, 2008). Barbara nelson is another member of the Carlson family who is still working at the helm of leadership in the company. He is the chairperson of Carlson Family Foundation and a member of Carlson Company Board of directors.

What made Carlson Company Successful

It is amazing how a company that started with only a loan of fifty-five dollars could grow to become a company worth billions. Many people are currently asking themselves what makes Carlson Company successful. The first thing is the company culture. It is important to create a good culture in the company as part of the company strategy for the purposes of increasing the company’s net worth. Additionally, it increases the company’s productivity. For this reason, Carlson Company has had a wonderful culture that has led to the tremendous growth.

In the beginning, Curt Carlson created a culture where all the employees of the company were respected for their work. Second, Carlson treated his employees equally and fairly. This meant that there is no discrimination of any kind in the office. This culture grew from the time the company was initiated to present where the company has received several awards for being the best place for workers to work. Therefore, the company has continued to increase productivity because their employees are motivated.

The other strategy that has led to the company success is heart and will of the owners. The owners of the company, Carlson family, have made it their own to see that the company becomes successful. The family has made it their life dedication to ensure that the company becomes successful despite all the hurdles they might pass through. In reality, if the owners of the company are dedicated to the company, they can do anything to make sure the company is successful. Therefore, Carlson himself is the greatest success to Carlson Company success due to his dedication.

What is Making Carlos Company to be Successful

The other factor that has led Carlson Company to be the most successful company is quality leadership skills of the management team. For instance, the management team of Carlson Company is all learned people who have a great wealth of experience in the different fields the company is dealing business. At the helm of leadership is Marilyn, a world-renowned expert leader and author who has rich international experience on leadership matters. This shows that the leaders are going to bring good strategies that will make the company to flourish. For this reason, Carlos Company is successful and it will continue to be successful.

Management and the employees of Carlson Company have worked as a unit to foresee the success of the company. In the past, Curtis Carlson thought that it was better to involve the employees in all company activities. In this case, the employees were highly motivated because they knew what was going to happen and they were part of the policymaking. Therefore, the employees are highly motivated. In the situation of Carlson Company, the employees were highly motivated and they improved the productivity of the company leading to the great success of the company. The most amazing thing is that the company continues to involve the employees in the decision-making process. This results in making the company successful.

Over the last few decades, technology has completely changed and many companies that are using the current technology have a competitive advantage over the other companies. In the case of Carlson Company, they bought the current information technology system for their company so that they could be able to gain the competitive advantage (Southgate, 2002). This system has improved the efficiency of work done in the company. Additionally, the system has improved customer relations department where the customer can easily access the services of Carlson Company (Southgate, 2002). Therefore, due to the increase in quality and efficiency of job performance by the employees and good customer relations, Carlson Company continues to be successful despite the current financial difficulties in the country.

Areas that Need Improvement in Carlson Company

Carlson Companies has been so successful over the last few decades since it was initiated by Carlson. However, certain weaknesses continue to affect the company’s success. In the past few years, there has been a global financial crisis affecting all the companies. This global financial crisis affected Carlson Company like many other companies. For example, people stopped booking their hotels due to the effects of the financial crisis. This led to a decrease in revenues in spite of the efforts the company was trying to make (Carlson Company, Inc. 2004).

In the same point of global financial crisis, the amount of supplies increased significantly. In this case, the prices of commodities like food supplies, furniture and supplies the company was buying rose. This means that expenses of the company had to increase significantly. When the revenues and the expenses are compared, it shows that the revenues were going down while the expenses were going up (Carlson Company, Inc. 2004). As a result, the profit generated reduced immensely to show this changes. For this reason, Carlson Company was becoming weak.

The weakness that is affecting Carlson Company is business risk. In all businesses, a certain amount of risk affects companies. The only differences are the level of effect to the companies. In Carlson Company, they have ventured too many risky businesses that have continually brought them down. Before the new chief executive officer was employed, the company had bought numerous businesses. These businesses are affiliated to the company. Therefore, all the problems attached to these companies have been transferred to Carlson Company. This has resulted to the company experiencing losses from the businesses acquired.

Finally, competition from other companies venturing in the same business has capitalized in the weakness left by Carlson Company. Over the few years, competitors of Carlson Company have continued to increase their customer base. At the same time, Carlson is reducing their customer base. This shows that the competitors are gaining competitive advantage over them (Carlson Company, Inc. 2004). For this reason, Carlson Company is being affected resulting in the reduction of the revenues.

Suggestions to Reduce Weakness in Carlson Company

One of the ways to reduce the weakness is to sell those companies that are bringing losses. In this case, they will acquire a lot of capital from selling the unprofitable businesses. This money can be used to increase revenue in other business ventures. Secondly, the losses attributed to the business will reduce drastically. Therefore, the first thing Carlson Company should consider is selling unproductive businesses.

The other suggestions that could help Carlson Company are to evaluate their strategies for the purposes of gaining competitive advantage. For instance, their pricing strategies should be evaluated so that they can attract customers. This will be extremely advantageous because they have high quality customer satisfaction. It will be noted that the customers will increase resulting to the increase in profits.

Finally, they should evaluate their strategies in relation to disasters and financial crisis. According to statistics, many businesses are caught unaware by the financial crisis of disasters leading to closure of business. In this case, Carlson Company should come up with a strategy that does not affect the business incase there was a financial crisis or a disaster. Therefore, if Carlson follows these suggestions, they are likely going to improve success of the company.

Conclusion

Carlson Company is a privately owned company. It is a family business that was started by Curt Carlson who created strategies that led to success of the business. Currently it is being led by Marilyn, Curt’s daughter. The company success is attributed to the company culture, dedication of the management team, teamwork and use of current trends in business. However, they have adversely been affected by the global financial crisis, business risks and the competitors. For this reason, they need to evaluate some of their strategies so that they can continue with the tremendous success rate.

References

Bloomberg Businessweek, (2012). Company Overview of Carlson Company Inc. Retrieved from: http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=160747

Carlson Company, Inc. (2004). Carlson Companies, Inc. SWOT Analysis. New York, NY: Datamonitor Plc.

Funding Universe, (2012). Carlson Company History. Retrieved from: http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/Carlson-Companies-Inc-Company-History.html

Nelson, M. C. (2008). How We Lead Matters: Reflections on a Life of Leadership. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Professionals.

Southgate, D. (2002). Chiefs’ Passion for Technology Drives Business Success. Tech Public. Retrieved from: http://www.techrepublic.com/article/chiefs-passion-for-technology-drives-business-success/1053702