Background information

Alcumatic develops and produces customised products in aluminium and has core competences within pressure die casting, machining and surface treatment. When the corona crisis broke out, Alcumatic experienced decline in production that made it difficult to realise the growth ambitions. The manager therefore accepted a process of counselling and advice offered by 'genstartnu.dk' aimed at strengthening marketing and sales. Genstartnu.dk (eng. trans.: 'restartnow.dk') is an initiative that the independent fund, the Danish Industry Foundation (da: Industriens Fund), launched in the early spring of 2020. The aim was to help Danish companies the best possible way through the difficult economic and commercial conditions that the corona pandemic entailed.

Content of measure

Alcumatic has 46 employees divided between skilled and unskilled workers in the production and salaried employees in administration. The company hired a new executive manager in January 2020. He should strengthen sales and marketing but after corona, everything stopped and the company had to dismiss five employees in April 2020. One of the main problems was that the manager could not meet the costumers in with marketing and sales meeting at their premises. He contacted the genstart.nu for advice and subsequently entered into a cooperation with a consultancy firm. Together they analysed the potential possibilities to act for the company and they agreed to set up a programme based on digital solutions and a more flexible organisation of work.

Based on the initial session, the consultant and the manager prepared a strategy to improve Alcumatic's sales, marketing and strategy through three tracks:

• Structured sales process. The manager puts a new pipeline management into use.
• Hedging of development areas. The management team lacked a common picture of the company's strengths and challenges, which could form the basis for prioritising future development areas. An old ERP system needed to be replaced.
• Additional sales through differentiation strategy. The consultant and the sales manager formulated 15 purchasing criteria, which focus on customer demand today and in the future, and how Alcumatic performs on these criteria in relation to their competitors (mainly from China). The purchase criteria are, among others, security of supply and environmental certifications.

Genstartnu.dk is an initiative that the independent Danish Industry Foundation launched in the early spring of 2020. The aim was to help Danish companies the best possible way through the difficult economic and commercial conditions that the corona pandemic entailed. The Danish Industry Foundation financed the consultancy and advisory course.

Use of measure

The sales manager has integrated the new tool for pipeline management into his daily sales work. The hope is that the new structured sales approach can increase the company's annual turnover by DKK 5-10 million (€0.66 - 1.33 million). To this end Alcumatic also reveived a grant for the implementation of a new ERP system via the program "SME: Digital".

Contents

• Employment retention
• Other topics
• Work organisation

Target groups

Workers	Businesses	Citizens
Does not apply to workers	SMEs	Does not apply to citizens

Actors and funding

Actors	Funding
Company / Companies Other social actors (e.g. NGOs)	No special funding required

Social partners

Social partners' role in designing the measure and form of involvement:

	Trade unions	Employers' organisations
Role	No involvement	No involvement
Form	Not applicable	Not applicable

Social partners' role in the implementation, monitoring and assessment phase:

• No involvement
• Main level of involvement: Company level

Involvement

The social partners were not involved in this measure targeted at keeping a company afloat through a differentiated business strategy.

Views and reactions

The social partners have not expressed special views in this case. However, they welcome all initiatives that aims to keep companies alive an maintain workplaces.

Sources

• 04 May 2020: Alu-virksomhed styrker salgsindsats gennem struktureret salgs-værktøj