Five ways your business can save money

As a savvy business owner, you are well aware of the fact that the more money you spend, the less money you have available to grow and expand your business through increasing your sales staff, increasing marketing efforts and more. In addition, higher expenses eat into your bottom line and decreases profitability. Because of this, it makes sense that you would be looking for a way to reduce costs and save money today. There are several ways that you can save money through your regular business activities.

Reduce Utility Expenses

When you consider reducing expenses, your utility bill may be one of the expenses that receive the least amount of attention. After all, you must use electricity to power office equipment, run your HVAC system and more. The fact is, however, that there are several steps that you can take to reduce this expense without decreasing the productivity or functionality of your office. For example, you can program your thermostat to save energy during the evenings and over the weekends when nobody is in the office. You can also advise the last person in the office to walk around and ensure that all machines are powered down each night. In some locations, you may also be able to save money by switching to a different energy provider that provides lower rates.

Minimize Travel Expenses

Travel expenses can quickly mount, and this is true even for a short business trip. It is true that face-to-face meetings with professional colleagues and clients often yield better results and deepens relationships than virtual meetings can. However, by limiting travel and cutting out wasteful spending on business expenses, your company can save a considerable amount of money.

By 401(K) 2013

Monitor Wages for Hourly Staff

If you are watching your business’ bottom line, it is understandable that your hourly staff may be watching their personal budget as well. It is common for hourly staff to try to squeeze as much money as possible out of their pay when punching the clock. Some will clock in as soon as they walk in the door and will linger talking to co-workers for many long minutes before leaving at the end of the day to inflate their paychecks. This can result in many additional hours of pay being applied to hourly staff’s paychecks. Monitor the work habits of your staff closely, and make an effort to minimize or eliminate this type of activity if it happens at your workplace.

Shop for New Vendors and Service Providers

If your company is like most, you utilize vendors for everything from stocking the break room with bottled water to replenishing toner in the copier machine. You can make a list of all of the vendors whose services you use on a regular basis. Then, systematically shop for lower rates for these services. In addition to shopping for rates, call the providers and vendors whose services you currently use and inquire about different plans that may be more cost-effective for you.

Eliminate Waste in Your Office

It is common for supervisors and managerial staff in a company to believe that different services or equipment is highly used and necessary. However, with a closer inspection or by speaking to your staff about their workday habits and duties in more detail, you may realize that some equipment, supplies and more are simply not needed. In some cases, it may be more cost-effective to outsource a service rather than to pay to have the equipment used on-site. For example, if you are leasing a full-color copier and largely only use it to make black and white copies, it may be more cost-effective to replace the color copier with a more affordable black and white model. When color copies are needed, you can use the services of a copying and printing company.
The fact is that many companies do have excessively high expenses. By reviewing your expenses in these areas, you may be able to identify some areas of wasteful spending, and you can take steps to reduce this spending to save money.

Author: Boris Dzhingarov is passionate about writing on different business topics. Follow him on Google+.