For and Against Stockpiling

Optimizing inventory is a more efficient way to cut costs than savings on paper, coffee, or employee snacks, experts claim, but few entrepreneurs perceive it as an effective cost-reduction measure. Quality inventory management, or deciding how much, when, and which items to order, implies a company’s ability to accurately forecast market needs.

The business weekly Lider, in its 155th issue, takes you through the world of economy, macro and microeconomics in a journalistic investigative manner and reveals interesting and current stories that are important for small and large entrepreneurs, ordinary citizens, and students.

It is becoming increasingly likely that the state will not build the lowland railway before 2018 and that discussions about financing this project will revolve around concessions on highways. HAC is already preparing documentation for granting a concession for the A3 Zagreb-Lipovac highway. Read more about this in Dragana Radusinović’s story ‘Highways Facing Concession Due to the Construction of the Lowland Railway Zagreb-Rijeka’.

The financial crisis triggered by the decline in the mortgage market in the SDA is currently in full swing. Most of the 13 economists and managers in Lider’s survey cite 2010 as the first possible deadline for the beginning of a period of higher GDP growth rates, while some expect a true economic revival even later. Are these results perhaps overly optimistic considering the serious financial crisis in the USA? Find out in Hrvoje Mateljić’s story ‘Economists and Entrepreneurs: The Crisis in Croatia Until 2010, If Not Longer’.

Inflation has reminded us of a somewhat forgotten recipe for cutting costs, which Bojana Božanić analyzes in this week’s topic. With ten percent less inventory, Croatian entrepreneurs could free up 8.8 billion kuna of trapped funds. Optimizing inventory is a more efficient way to cut costs than savings on paper, coffee, or employee snacks, experts claim, but few entrepreneurs perceive it as a very effective cost-reduction measure. Quality inventory management, or deciding how much, when, and which items to order, implies a company’s ability to accurately forecast market needs. In Lider’s topic of the week, find out why inventory is a necessary evil, and if you already have it, how to manage it wisely. As part of the topic of the week, our advisor Marija Zuber writes about the legal side of excess inventory and unfair trading. 

Recently, we have witnessed how small distributors are increasingly becoming targets for stronger competitors. Instead of classic acquisitions, small distributors will lose the brands they represent. It is, of course, cheaper to acquire a brand than an entire distribution company with all its costs. However, more about this is known by Antonija Knežević.

Why is the Association of Mandarin Producers Neretva dissatisfied with the purchase price and why is there great nervousness in the air? Read about it from Edis Felić in the story ‘Jambo in Open War Against Konzum Seeks an Ally in Mercator’.

Matilda Bačelić writes about the fate of the failed textile company from Dugoreš. In the story ‘Vinko Barišić Gathered a Consortium to Take Over the Cotton Industry’, read which companies make up the consortium and, of course, what their business plans and ambitions are regarding the struggling company.

Whoever does not create a recognizable product before entering the EU will disappear from the market, is a phrase we hear every day. However, Antonija Knežević investigated how things stand in the meat market and came to a staggering conclusion. Namely, out of 300 companies, only 30 will survive consolidation. Why?

Tomislav Birtić, in his diary column titled ‘Shearing Tens of Thousands of Sheep on Crobex 6,000 is a Done Deal’, reveals to us why he dreams of initial public offerings of companies with about twenty employees and why, alongside a live stock exchange, companies would go to banks where money is the most expensive?!

In the Business Knowledge section, read why the manager’s function in Croatia is riskier than the job of a test pilot, what the seven deadly sins of career development for leaders are, and what the real reasons for burnout at work and the breakdown of many Croatian managers are.
 
With your morning coffee, you will surely be entertained by the serial that this time is handled by Sanjaya Jha, the new Motorola leader responsible for spinning off the Mobile Unit. By the end of the year, Motorola will split into two public companies. (G. J.)

The new Lider gifts its readers two specials ‘The Future of Media’ and ‘Transport