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56 • FOODSERVICE EQUIPMENT & SUPPLIES • MAY 2015 players and it is important to under- stand what the other does." Touring the building that houses the Webstaurant- Store, IT department and other busi- ness services is unlike visiting any other dealership in the U.S. There's a gym where associates and their spouses can exercise, ping pong and billiards tables, a popcorn machine, a soda fountain and more. Even the decorations are unique, with everything from graphics that mimic video games or other famous drawings to an 1800s-era American fag to bamboo plants. In addition to serving as a training venue, the test kitchen also helps build community within Clark Associates. For example, once a month the com- pany hosts a birthday lunch. Associates who share the same birthday month come to the test kitchen and work together to prepare lunch for everyone else in the building. Not only does it help build community, these associates get to interact with others from various departments and learn more about the foodservice equipment and supplies the company sells. "Having these resources really helps when [we] talk to a potential new hire and eventually bring someone on board. We expect a lot from our people but they should also feel the company acknowledges what they have accom- plished," Groff says. "As we get bigger it's harder to know everyone. Having the ping pong table is a way to get to know each other and build community." Don't, however, confuse this environment with being soft on performance. "The tech and market- ing worlds are performance based. We know if we are getting something done and have performance metrics for every single department. You see them when you walk through the building," Garber says. "We know how many photos each employee took and how many descriptions each writer wrote. We know every ticket a programmer handled. They have thresholds they have to hit. We put a lot of trust into our employees in every one of our divisions. You can goof off and that will show or you can work incredibly hard and get a lot done and that will show." "It is an adult work environment. We don't micromanage and when you make people feel good and trusted they will do better," Weaver adds. Managing Growth Over the past eight years, Clark Associates opened six warehouses and one cash-and-carry store, while remodeling two other retail locations. In other words, there's no time for complacency. "Fred has always had very high expectations. He's a very fair person but you can't say Fred's complacent," Garber says. "We do it better every time. Because of our growth the way we did things yesterday is not the way we will do it tomorrow," Weaver says. "That's our biggest challenge because we have a lot of new people trying to learn our business model and we have to react to our growth at the same time. Indeed, data plays a key role when Clark Associates evaluates new oppor- tunities and tries to measure the perfor- mance of the business in general. The company will test some of the ideas out and then let the data determine its fate. "It becomes cut and dry as to whether it works," Garber adds. "We are a very data-driven company. And with the data we have available to us, why wouldn't you be? You would be wasting a lot of opportunity if you did not maximize the data available to you." Of course in the fast-paced world of e-commerce, managing customer expectations, specifcally when things don't go according to plan, can make or break an organization. And Clark Associates is no exception. Garber sees all of the complaints that come in about the sites for The WebstaurantStore and The Restaurant Store. Site-related complaints are sent to a developer or a designer to fx the issue and work with a customer service agent to reach out to any clients the issue may have affected. "I love complaints more than compliments because you can learn more from them," Garber adds. "We will roll out something similar to Amazon where customers can review how we did with their shipment. And we will be able to track the review of a package all the way down to the employee that packed it." This will enable the Clark team to know how the customer feels about every aspect of their purchase and provide the employee with metrics by which to measure their performance. "One of the hardest things to do when making a website is to look at it from a customer's perspective and that's what we do here," Garber says. "We look at some sites and wonder if anyone has ever gone through it. I shop online and some of things sites will do are mind boggling. And I shop on our site as do some of our people. And when you have highly entrepreneurial, motivated people looking at your site they see things that can be improved." Another aspect that keeps Clark As- sociates nimble is its lack of corporate bureaucracy. This helps the company maintain its customer focus and facili- tates speed to market. "When I make a decision to open a new store, our team makes a plan, submits it to accounting and that gets the ball rolling," Leaman points out. "We are forever chang- ing and adapting to the climate of the business world. It's not like turning an aircraft carrier." And Fred Clark gives his managers room to roam. "It is important to em- power your managers and Fred trusts his managers. You have to be able to trust your managers and that they are able to take it to the next level," Weaver says. Being open to change is part of the company DNA at Clark Associates and it starts at the top. "Fred's philosophy is "I would rather be pulling you back than pushing you forward," Garber says. "If I get too cautious, you can tell he's not too happy." But by all accounts, it would seem that there's lots to be happy about.