It took more time than anyone anticipated to get moving, 4 to 5 years, but then the company really took off. AMI sales were directly generated by telephone sales people, as well as by direct mail marketing and advertising, all were profitable.

Art’s travelin’
For over three years Art traveled from New York, to Brazil, to Africa, China, Europe, New Zealand and more, speaking on management, motivation, sales and at the same time selling videos in other countries. The international marketing swelled to 70 countries.

Year six
AMI moves again, with brand new much larger offices some 6000+ square feet. Wow, what fun and profit this American Media. It was growing, and getting stronger, and the recognition from the customers was evident, receiving lots of incoming calls, and great sales. During the six years a number of excellent productions were completed, ballooning the bottom-line. Now on board, 28 people, mostly marketers, sellers, a few production people, and of course accounting, and fulfillment.

Year twelve
Art, “Why not, try to double our sales force in 5 months, from 11 to 22 sales people.” It worked and sales shot up. One day Art said, “Now I want some really big growth, 50%.” But he didn’t like round numbers, so the goal was set at 52%. “Impossible” the team said, “Absolutely impossible, it can’t be done, no way.” Well, maybe you’re right, but let’s play crazy and try for 52%. Nothing ventured nothing gained, you know” Art continued.

Let’s treat these people with great respect
“ Let’s motivate these people. If we achieve our larger than life goals every team member can go for a week to Europe, all expenses paid” said Art. Not just management, not just sales people, everyone had the same opportunity, talk about loyalty.

One year later
Sad, so sad, the sales goal of 52% was missed. But that great sales team with a great attitude a lot of talent, skill, motivation and drive had worked hard those twelve months, really hard. But, but… they did make 47%.. not bad. Sixteen people did sail for Europe as a second tier bonus. Whew, let’s do it again!

The next eight years
Well, for the next eight years sales grew by an 18% average, compounded.

The success formulas

• Communication: E+I=C (E=Emotion, I=Information, C=Communication)
  
• Productivity: 3a+m=R+m (a=actions, m=measurement, R=Results)
  The formulas worked extremely well; they created a whole new language, and became wonderful communication tools at AMI..

The book
Art had an eye-opening experience, by reading a wonderful book titled Future Perfect by Stan Davis. It changed his life and the life of AMI and its great team. The book’s message… “Get into the ownership of intellectual property in a big way.” AMI did just that, and three months later Art hired a head of Intellectual Property, within two years the team member became Vice President of Intellectual Property, and things took off.

Another move
On to bigger and better things. AMI was bursting at the seams, 15,000 square feet and no place to sit. “We gotta get outta here.” Next stop two miles away, a beautiful building almost 40,000 square feet, perfect! A giant room, design it any way you want, to exacting needs and specs, including a giant studio. Life was good! Now 80+ employees, Art was happy, the team was happy, the accountants were happy, and the customers were happy.

Get in the custom production business
A good business, custom production became 10% of gross sales, and a way for generic and custom productions to share overhead. The idea worked, good savings, good productivity, good profits. Now 60+ productions a year.

Hey, get in the book business
It was time to move into the book business. Three years later and 28 authors AMI owned the intellectual property of 50+ books (all AMI published). The books complimented the videos like peanut butter and chocolate. The customers loved the books, AMI did too.

Let’s add a new product line now
A $600.00+ average price tag, and lots of people want the videos, but some customers were beginning to buy competitor’s $99.00 versions. It’s time to make another move. The team went shopping to buy a $99.00 video company. They found one, but the numbers just didn’t make good business sense. So, the team started building from scratch, buying bits of product lines, producing, and beginning to sell $99.00 video products, and it worked. In the succeeding months sales rose almost exponentially. But, the profit was low… pull up, pull up.

Now 10 million direct mail pieces
In one year including the $99.00 product line, over 10 million AMI direct mail pieces and catalogs were mailed, big mailings, big sales.

100 people- What a team
When people visited AMI they would say, ”Where did you get these people, they’re great.” People, that’s what Art was most proud of at AMI, GREAT people.

Only two things important at AMI
There were only two things that were really most valuable in leading the company and AMI had them both:

1. A GREAT IDEA, vision and goals, and...
2. GREAT PEOPLE!

Let’s Expand Some More
Produce, Produce, Produce… but it was still not enough. “OK, let’s try our luck at buying companies again.” This time the bulls eye was pierced. Barr Films of Los Angeles, had great products along with a good price. “Let’s buy the company” said Art. A good price was finally negotiated, and we owned Barr Films. The team had bets for two years, how soon would AMI pay the bank loan off and be totally debt free again from that acquisition? Remember, most of AMI’s life it was debt free. Two years, and one of the acquired videos starring Dennis Franz, The Sid Story carried the entire debt, it became a great seller, the debt was back to zero.

The awards
Art, was nominated twice and a finalist twice for the Entrepreneur of the Year Award by Ernst and Young. The Blue Chip Enterprise Award was an exciting one for Art to win. He has designed, produced and directed more than 1000 award winning training films, DVDs, videos, and CDs too. From those products AMI won over a 130 prestigious national and international awards.

JITI is invented
What is JITI? Just In Time Information, The Consultant. A computer based seminal idea that is really a management/people problem solving tool. “Its not training, but it’s the best training in the world” Art would say. In under five minutes the user has a solution to 85% of all management/people problems. It works, and it is a great idea to this day.

Come on, AMI couldn’t really be that good!
Right, there were many down times, but with a good team the company sometimes struggled but kept attitudes and optimism intact. Some video products didn’t sell as well, but 100% of them made a profit. The economy side-swiped AMI more than once, and the company certainly had its share of problems and bad times, but overall, AMI remained optimistic and bottom line successful.

It’s time to take some chips off the table
Art wants to sell, and take a some chips off the table. After he shopped a dozen buyers he found one he liked, and sold AMI to Provant. Art stayed on for almost year, and was able to dissolve his no compete agreement, with freedom at last.

The day Art left AMI
The day Art left AMI there were 132 people, or as Art still likes to say it, 132 GREAT people. You should have met them. You could feel the attitude and energy when you walked in the door. Top line sales the day he left were 2.5 times AMI’s nearest competitor world-wide.

It was an experience for Art and his team like no other. What an opportunity to practice the leadership ideas he learned at BBH&S, AMI, OJT and the world. No one could ask for more. It was a glorious 22.5 years.

Only regret
Art wished he had set his goals even higher at American Media, he knows he could have reached them.
But, it’s never too late…. Second story in a series… coming soon!