The new NSSRA Cost of Doing Business Survey is a excellent tool for shops to examine their profitability and productivity. “However, many shops fail to use it, “ NSSRA President Thomas B. Doyle said. “The primary reason is that shops perceive doing the calculations as a pain.”

To address this problem, NSSRA has created a Business Performance Assessment using an Excel workbook with the formulas built in.

From the full CODB Survey, NSSRA selected certain key financial performance ratios and provided a format that allows shops to enter company information to access those ratios without inputting or doing calculations. A shop enters select information from its company’s Income Statement & Balance Sheet plus a few facts about its business (e.g. number of employees, square footage, etc.) Full instructions on how to use the workbook are provided in the Introduction.

The workbook generates key ratios comparing the shop’s business to industry ratios for five shop categories --- Ski Shops by $ Volume (Less than $750,000; Less than $1.5 million; More than $1.5 million; and More than $3 million); Single Shops & Multiple Shops; Single Shops by Selling Square Footage; and All Specialty Shops by $ Volume.

“When ratios differ significantly from industry averages, a shop can review those areas to see what improvements might be made to improve productivity and profitability,” Doyle said.

The new survey had a 50% better response rate than the previous edition, providing an improved financial tool for ski and snowboard shops. The survey, done every two years, is the sixth produced by the Association.

NSSRA members may request the workbook by e-mailing tdoyle@nssra.com and putting CODB Business Performance Assessment in the Subject Box. Non-members may get both the NSSRA Cost of Doing Business and the workbook by becoming NSSRA members.