We appreciate the patience with our communications and we are aware that they could both be more frequent, as well as more significant from an actual financial and production performance perspective. We plan on delivering a material improvement in our SH communications by the end of January, including sales and marketing strategies. We will also implement a SH area on the website with critical information and data updated regularly.
Financial Reporting and Shareholder Communications
We plan to onboard a fractional CFO to assist us with:
- Review of books to ensure all items are properly accounted for, with the main focus being on inventory expense
- Assistance with preparation of annual/quarterly budgets, and projections for presentations
- Preparation of a dashboard for known financial indicators that will be included in SH updates going forward
- Strategic guidance on getting to B/E point
- Prepare all financial information in a professional manner if we decide to approach institutional lending, and guidance therein
We have two candidates right now, and one was introduced to us through a current Shareholder. He has a lot of experience and formerly worked with CUBE. He is also a Lean Six Sigma blackbelt (an accreditation showing master competency with lean manufacturing), which will be a big help in terms of deeply understanding our process and being able to communicate it to others. The terms are also very reasonable and flexible and on an as needed basis.
If anyone would like to interview him as a second opinion, we would be open to setting that up. Please let me know.
Going LEAN
In addition to professionalizing our financial reporting, we are implementing many core lean manufacturing principles into our process. We were awarded a free Lean Manufacturing practical application program and have commenced putting it into place. The whole team is very excited about this, and if done properly, which I am confident it will be, we should be reaching our 20 units per month in mid 2025. The more exciting part is that it is a constantly evolving system of improvement, embedded into the practice, and encourages whole team input.
In conjunction with the above, we are also in the process of evaluating whether a robotic automation can assist us in the the slowest, most turnover prone, area of our process: sanding. It is looking like a robotic arm can utilize specialized sanding heads to complete up to 80% of the work, while the prep for paint team can finish off the last bit that usually needs the human eye and know-how. We're excited about this. The idea is to not replace people, but increase throughput with the same amount of people. We should also be eligible for a grant to perform these tasks as well, which would cover 80% of labor involved with implementation. Timing on this is TBD, though research on the application has commenced.
We were invited to participate in a FedDev grant for 2025 with the company that has been assisting us with Lean Manufacturing. If awarded, they will be assisting us for 12-18 months in analyzing our production as well as preparing us for digitization and automation. I cannot say how probable winning that grant is, but it would be a huge assistance to us towards break even and beyond.
Customer Relations
We are aware that our customer relations and communications need improving. We have developed a semi-automated messaging system to keep all customers as well notified as possible. You can see an example HERE. This is the template that we will use for all customers, including dealers and shareholder framesets, going forward. It should lead to better relations and information to make sure that they are coming along for the ride and see the progress as it happens. It also allows for us to have more engagements with them along the way, possibly leading to additional sales.
Fundraise
We continue to fundraise and secured $150k this week which takes us close to 1M CAD raised this year. Given the challenges with private capital/risk investing this year, we think this is an achievement, though still short of our goal. The battle continues, and as always, please let us know if you have anyone to refer to us.
Best Bike of 2024
If you have not seen it yet, a very well respected reviewer awarded us the best bike of 2024, by David Arthur from Just Ride Bikes. Yes, this is one opinion, but he sampled almost all meaningful brands out there, and we rose to the top. We are all very excited about this and it is definitely some great validation.
Also, in a private email to us after the fact, mentioned that it was a "no brainer." A solid feather in our cap. We already have other media/demo bikes in process in order to get other mainstream editor opinions and continue to build a solid public ecosystem of Surveyor reviews.
Best Endurance bike and the only one he mentions he wants to buy: Watch here
Overall Champion of the Year: Watch here
As always, reach out directly should you have any further questions, and expect much more professional reporting and access to metrics in early 2025.
Cheers,
Mike and Frank
