Quality

The company I founded, Speed By Spectre, is a High Quality Products Company, even though our products are quite affordable to many people, not just the few rich ones. Does this make sense? Absolutely!
It's a crazy world we live in. Especially now. Things are changing very fast. Not just technology [ remember fax machines? Do you even know what a fax machine is? ] But also political events, whole economies, everything is moving at a faster pace with no indication of any slow down whatsoever.
So now is an excellent time to discuss the essence of "quality", what it is, and why it is becoming such a rare commodity.
First, what is quality? A lot of people think that quality can be equated with cost, as in, the higher the cost, the higher the quality. This is true only to some extent. Maybe it used to be this way. maybe. I don't know. I do know that this isn't the case any more.
For example, if you were to ask a bunch of people to name a High Quality Airline, you would probably get names such as United, American, Lufthansa, Cathay and so on....... One name that probably won't make the list is Southwest Airlines. Why? I'll tell you why, because they are a "discount fare" airline. They are cheap. They are certainly cheaper than the other airlines, day in and day out. But that shouldn't make theirs any less of a quality product, should it? Now, I may be biased here because I happen to fly Southwest a lot, about 400 times a year actually [ I commute from my house to work and and back, 400 miles every day.... ] and that makes me an expert in airline quality. I define quality for airlines with two things: Safety and On Time. Southwest doesn't crash. At least they haven't lost any passenger lives yet. They've been around 35 years. They fly a lot. No crashes so far. Pretty good I would say. As a guy who flies 400 times a year, not crashing is very important to me. And, so is being on time. If there's one thing I can't stand it's flight delays, and Southwest, again, is at the top of the list when it comes to being on time.
So just because they are one of the lower cost airlines doesn't make them any less of a quality airline, it actually makes them the best, in my eyes; No Crashes, On Time, Low Prices. Can you beat that? It is what I call High Quality. We emulate that at Speed By Spectre and use the same formula as Southwest, and that is being as efficient as we can be. And then come back the next day and improve on that even more. We sell some pretty kick ass products, they perform at the very highest levels possible, and all that at reasonable prices. We could charge more, but then, so could Southwest...... We don't because our business model is one built for the long haul- deliver a great deal of high quality goods to as many people, in the most efficient manner possible.
Two other of my favorite high quality producers are; The restaurant chain Cracker Barrel, and the TV show Top Gear on the BBC.
Cracker Barrel is reasonable priced, but the TV show has no price, so how does that rate? High quality, at the very end, is not about price at all, it is about something dull, and boring and unexciting, and that is called consistency. For something to achieve a level of High Quality, it has to be consistent. The same thing, every day, no changes, no surprises, no drama, just the same quality product that you come to expect. It's the same thing we strive for at Speed By Spectre; no surprises, nothing startling, nothing to catch you off guard. It sounds boring, but it is the epitome of High Quality.
There are tremendous pressures on all companies nowadays due to the very difficult economic climate. And it's not going to get any easier. many people are looking to cut corners, but this cuts into quality. We won't have any of that. We'll keep doing what we've been doing all along, and have gotten good at....... being super efficient day in and day out. Lean and Mean from day one, not much has changed. We are Consistent Quality.
Unlike our competitors, for example, many of whom have been bought and sold, gone into bankruptcy, come out of bankruptcy, been reorganized and some have just plain gone out of business, we're still here, entering our 26th year, same management, same philosophy, same old same old...... I know, boring, but consistent! Exactly what High Quality is all about.
Thanks,
Amir Rosenbaum #86