In 1942 Erwin Rommel commandered the German Panzer division that was sweeping across North Africa. With little opposition Rommel was routing his enemy and pushing towards Egypt. The British had nothing to throw at Rommel and the future looked dim. If the Germans were to reach Cairo the Allied war effort would be in serious trouble as the Panzers would open up the rich oilfields of the Middle East, giving the German war machine unfetted access to oil.
In mid-1942 British High Command took the decision to install a new commander for the badly depleted British Eighth Army. Immediately after taking control of the situation General Bernard “Monty” Montgomery changed the British tactics. Controversially Monty decided to stay and fight. He ordered his men to dig in and to make the defences impenetrable. It’s said that High Ranking Officers were physically sick when he ordered all fallback, retreat and surrender plans be burned. There was to be no option but to fight to the death.
In the current impending recession businesses need to make the same kind of decisions. Do they make a whole-hearted, brazen stance and aim to weather the storm, or is it better to cut losses early and leave the market before compiling too much debt?
From an outsider’s perspective, those companies that “stay and fight” might look stupid risking capital, reputation and goodwill. But the potential upside for the companies that are still alive when the economy turns is massive. They will have a database of customers, intellectual property, reputation and a few years of experience.
On the other hand, some companies don’t have this luxury. Imagine a listed company with shareholders making the same kind of stance! (I’m talking deliberately, not through negligence). Our parent company is publicly listed with shareholders all over the world. I’m pretty sure the majority of these people would be pretty angry if they lost all their money through a strategy as outlined above. Our little division that runs 2Large2Email is pretty aggressive but we’re also formulating plans to ride out this nasty financial crisis wave. We want to be around, helping people send their files, for many years yet.
So don’t expect 2Large2Email to hit the headlines because of some mad “dot-com-boom” style “get users at any cost” shennanigans like giving away cars or trips to the moon or whatever. We’ll just focus on running a solid little business that sends large files, thank you very much.
Note: In case you didn’t know, Monty and the Allies won at Alamein, driving Rommel from North Africa and depriving the Germans of the much sought-after oil. That’s a pretty big upside.
