We don't do business in a vacuum

Whether your operations are part of a huge corporation or you're an independent distributor, you're not alone in your market.

Competitors and regulators are always with us, and both must be managed strategically on a day-to-day basis so that your operations continue to run smoothly and effectively.

We have a report in this issue that will help you to deal with the regulators — specifically, the representatives of the U.S. Department of Transportation — and we are planning a report for our next issue will help you to deal with the competition.

For this issue, Senior Editor Richard Mandel spent a day with Mike Dodd, a consultant who provides thorough reviews of companies' records and systems to prepare distributors for a DOT inspection.

Dodd's reviews aren't simple and, often, they are not easy, but having a review from him is easier than being unprepared when the DOT inspectors are on your doorstep. Concerns for safety and record keeping at a gas distributor is of keen interest at the DOT, especially with the increased level of oversight that has arisen from the terrorist attacks on the U.S. five years ago and the inception of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Besides a report on the way Dodd reviews a company's records, we have included a checklist of items that the DOT inspectors will consider in their assessment of operations. Every company should have a plan to meet the requirements of a DOT inspection, and the checklist will help you to make a start.

While visits from regulators can be random and infrequent, competition is a guaranteed and consistent challenge. Each of us has to find ways each day to battle a little more effectively. But we can't sharpen our competitive weapons if we're not sure what they are or how effective they are.

We are putting together a tool that is designed to help you determine where you are and where you could go with the business components you have.

We launched an industry-wide survey in our May/June issue, and asked readers to take the time to fill it out. More than 325 people responded, providing us with valuable information on the way distribution businesses are run and facts on the best practices that are being used to make distributors successful. We hired an independent company to conduct and assemble the survey is compiling the data, and we expect to present the results to you in our next issue. The volume of responses ensures that the findings of the survey will be valid and applicable to your business.

This tool was designed to provide benchmarks that you can measure against your operations, and to compare to similar operations across the nation.

I want to thank everyone who took the time to respond to our survey. It wasn't simple, but we expect the commitment of time and effort to reach the answers will give you ways to do make your operations better.