Which future for Borsalino ?
One of the most iconic Italian brands, hats-maker Borsalino, filled for Bankruptcy on 18 December 2017. This story proves that even the most renown brands, those with the longest history (110 years of activity) are not immune against evolving market trends and must reinvent themselves continuously. I dedicated an article to yet another iconic Italian brand, Richard Ginori. It was created in the eighteenth (1735) century and filled...
Have black boxes led to bankruptcies in the restaurant industry ?
Back in 2015 Belgian authorities announced that B2C firms selling more than 25000€ per year in food (restaurants thus), would have to be equipped by July 2016 with a new model of cash register containing a black box registering all transactions. This, the authorities said, would put a stop to black money transactions. The restaurant industry reacted harshly and claimed that this measure would lead to massive bankruptcies, the reason...
Entrepreneurship in Belgium : is the situation really so worrying ?
Recent articles in newspapers pointed the decrease of firm creation in Belgium, especially in the Southern part of the country when the creation rate was said to have decreased 11.2% We downloaded the figures from BeStat, the official repository of statistical figures for Belgium, and the reality looks slightly different. To evaluate the number of new firms, we used as proxy the application for VAT numbers. Contradicting articles :...
Do firms go bankrupt more often than before in Belgium?
Two weeks ago we dealt with the previsions of bankruptcies in Europe and more particularly in Belgium. We said that the number of bankruptcies will keep increasing in Belgium to reach 11500 firms’ failures by the end of 2014. This figure should however be compared to firms’ creation figures. This is what we do here. The number of bankruptcies increases … One thing is clear from the graph below, the number of bankruptcies has increased...
Which perspectives for firms’ bankruptcies in 2014
More than 11000 firms went bankrupt in Belgium in 2013. Will 2014 be as bad as 2013 ? Bankruptcies all-time high in Belgium 11052 bankruptcies and 27912 jobs lost: those are the sad figures of bankruptcies in Belgium for the year 2013. It’s unfortunately an all-time record. Whereas startups still get affected by bankruptcy in their first years (read our post on the truth about startup failures), the Brussels Chamber of Commerce...
How and why data analysis can help increase your profitability and fuel your growth
We are currently doing several big data-based assignments for very various clients and we’d like to share with you common mistakes that are often made by companies when considering analyzing their data. Mistake #1: where is my data? First of all what we see is that most companies have a HUGE problem finding their data. Either they don’t have collected data at all (which often is the case in retail environments and we know brands with...
Here’s why Aigle’s new marketing strategy works amazingly well
One of the advantages of having a strong brand is that meaningful diversification can enable you to unlock growth. Here’s the example of Aigle, an historic brand of rubber boots which has diversified into side products. Aigle has manufactured its famous rubber boots since 1967 in Châtellerault (France) and launched its outdoor strategy in 1989. The group went through difficult times however and was taken over in 2004. The revamping of...
What happens when banks are not financing firms’ growth
Here’s the real story of an entrepreneur who manages a 50-year old profitable company in the heart of Belgium. This is the amazing story of a company about to die. A flawless history of positive returns The family business was founded more than 50 years ago and grew on the need for special metal components and made-to-measure equipment. The founder retired 25 years ago and his son took over. He’s now 47. The current owner explained me...
The truth about business failure and bankruptcies
There are few topics in the entrepreneurship and SME world of research that are as much discussed as the failure rate of new businesses (what we call generally “startups”). Here’s the truth about it. You all have heard of alarming statistics : 50% of startups die within 2 years or even 1 year, 75% within 7 years, etc … at the same time certain people advocate that these figures are completely false and do not deserve credit. I’ve...
Crowdfunding: the consequence of banks not financing startups
We have dealt already several times with crowdfunding on this blog. As I explained in a post not so long ago several alternatives exist (in terms of business model). I explained the model of Look&Fin (a relatively –yet with good media exposure- new entrant on the market) and stressed some weaknesses. Yet, despite these weaknesses, I must admit I’m pretty impressed by how well they are doing and the quality of their pick. The...
Even century-old firms die … because they don’t adapt
Darwin was right … those who adapt will survive and in the race to survival smaller species seem better placed. This seems also to be true for firms. The biggest ones are not –always- the most resistant to shocks and the quickest to change. Browsing recently through my archives I found back the articles that the Italian press dedicated to Richard Ginori, a eighteenth century firm that went bankrupt in early 2013. Richard Ginori, a...
Tribute to a company that has died : L’Edito
L’Edito was one startup that I met in late 2012 because of their passion for design, beautiful objects and their co-creation processes. Like other firms before them, their business model was based on crowd-sourced design and funding. Individuals could present to the world their projects of furniture and if enough people were interested to buy the design, the piece of furniture could go in production. Unlike many competitors l’Edito...
Do High-Tech startups deserve so much support? What about Low-Tech firms?
Hi-tech startups receive a great deal of attention in the press and from official authorities; they are sexy, make cool products, are usually launched by talented young guys with excellent engineering / business degrees. The purpose of my post today is to show that the “sexyness” of a project or the intellectual content of it should not make us forget that there are many other firms out there, called Low-Tech companies, that deserve...
