This is the second of my blogs that is trying to answer the question “What does the future of x-ray dealer look like?”

So far I’ve said:

  • Define your “mission statement” to a single actionable word, if possible. (For the history and/or religious buffs among you, remember the story about the 2nd century Jewish scholar Hillel: a gentile asks to be taught the whole Torah while standing on one leg. Hillel replies, “That which is hateful to you, do not do unto another: This is the whole Torah. The rest is commentary — [and now] go study.”
  • If your supply and/or customer “partners” don’t play nice, get new partners. In fulfilling your mission you have to help them fulfill theirs and vice-versa.  Value yourself and others will value you.

Now let’s talk about what I call the business “Circle of Life”.

First, it might be interesting to know more about my journey.  After business school I purchased a small x-ray viewbox manufacturing company called American Medical Sales.  That was 1981, and I purchased it for $40,000 including the existing, mostly worthless, inventory.

I grew that business from a two product manufacturer to a full line imaging accessories manufacturer and distributor. We eventually had more than two hundred products, including sophisticated quality control equipment.  Through our association with a German manufacturer, we became the largest distributor of mammography motorized viewers in North America.

We were always looking for new opportunities.  In the 1990’s, when we started to see CR’s enter the market we wrote the software for our first small market PACS system.  We called it PACS-in-a-BOX.

When something called the DMIST study came out that said digital mammo was as good as or better than film mammo, we knew the deathknell for x-ray illuminators had finally come.   We knew it was time to move on and closed our manufacturing operation in 2010.  Since then, many of our former competitors have closed their manufacturing plants or gone bankrupt.

Today we still distribute accessories, we still have an active and profitable PACS business and, as most of you know, we have a very active equipment brokering business.

The theme is – change your business before your business changes (i.e. destroys) you.

Let’s talk about change.  1981 vs. 2017.  Need I say more?  The x-ray dealer’s world has been turned upside down several times in this period.

We may not have liked the smell of processing chemicals, but what would we not give to have a consumables business model again?  And what about all those accessories we used to sell to support the film business?  And do you remember the great service business we used to have for all those processors and accessories?  Equipment sales were important in the 20th century, but there were also whole businesses devoted to chemistry sales and film.  Equipment was secondary for many dealers.

Next, we began to experience rapid-fire technology changes.  Just as we were learning to sell one type of digital system, another better one came to market.  How many “schools” did your engineers need to go to and did you have to pay for just to keep current.

During these years, while basic x-ray equipment remained the same, there were several waves of dealer consolidations and many dealers just closed shop.

These changes all but eliminated the “consumables” business model and made most dealers equipment sales centric with a heavy dose of mechanical and IT service.

So today, the x-ray dealer looks like this:

  • Mostly an equipment sales organization. Sells both new and pre-owned equipment.
  • Stronger in IT sales (PACS, mostly) to support the “internet of everything”… imaging style.
  • Strong service department, both for mechanical and IT.

Consumables, such as film, and accessories, such as radiation protection and positioning aides, etc. have become minimal for all but those companies heavily involved in internet and/or catalog sales.

But is this model sustainable?  Is there an x-ray dealer in the future?

The change mantra can be summarized as follows: “Get bigger, get smaller or go home”.  In the first wave, we saw the creation of the national dealer model like Diagnostic Imaging or NHD (independent dealers trying to work together).  Then, there was Picker morphing to Marconi, morphing to Philips, the “accessory” group becoming SourceOne and finally being bought by Merry X-Ray to create another national x-ray dealer.  As Merry continues to buy smaller dealers, some of the larger independents have been attempting to grow into meaningful regional players.

At the other end of the spectrum, I have seen well-managed smaller dealers aggressively trim their operational costs.  They have streamlined their methods and procedures, reduced the number of employees and shed warehouses.  They pack their service vans with more parts so warehouses can be smaller, and control of this inventory is tighter due to better tracking of hard dollar objects.  Owners are going back into the field and showing the youngsters a thing or two about sales techniques.

What is the future of the x-ray dealer? Part 2 of Answer:  Change is the only certainty and should be welcomed.  Each of us has an “arc” to our lives and so do our businesses.  Like my puppy dog, keep all of your senses active, embrace new developments and always devote some effort to experimenting with new ideas.

Next blog…”Are there other models to consider?”