by Roy Taylor, Business to Business Coorespondent

Crossroads Global Handicrafts-Carol Schrantz, Manager: “We moved our business in early June 1995, and the process kept us busy. All of us worked as volunteers throughout the process. We only moved one block, so it wasn’t too far, but we did the most of the moving by hand. The move mainly involved rolling our merchandise and fixtures down the street on hand carts. We did use one truck, but only for a couple of trips. It was a lot of work, but one of our volunteers celebrated her birthday while we were moving, so we had some fun, too. Our new location on the corner of Center and Market is better for business. We have twice the space, it is much lighter with all the windows we have, and all the work is definitely worth it.”

Prairie Sign Works-Mark Mocilan, General Manager: “We are in the middle of our move right now, and there have been some unforeseen circumstances that have made it a hassle. These few months are usually the slowest time of the year for us, but this January and February have been the busiest January and February we’ve ever had. We have been moving a little at a time, and will complete the process by March 1. The deal for our new location was completed so fast that we didn’t have time to plan, and we currently have a lease in our present location until July. We are looking for a business to take over this location so we don’t have to pay for extra rent. We are excited, however, to be moving. It gives us about 14,000 sq. ft. in the building and two acres of land, whereas our current building is only 8,000 sq. ft. Although we have not yet completed the move, we have been using the new premises to work on several billboards we just didn’t have the room to construct before.”

Federal Johnson Moving and Storage-David Best, Manager: “Before we moved into our new facility, we were splitting our activities between two different, smaller locations, and this caused us to miss many opportunities in the marketplace. Probably the most difficult aspect of this situation was trying to coordinate communications between the two locations. In January, we moved into one location, and our usable space increased from 13,000 to 34,000 sq. ft. We’ve been here just over a month, and we’re already using 75 percent of the space that we have. Overall, our move resulted in a tremendous efficiency gain for the company. Morale and attitude of our employees is better because we now have room to be comfortable.”

Denny’s Doughnuts-Denny Marquardt, Owner: “We moved a month ago and everything is pretty much still in boxes. Our operation is non-stop. We have corporate and wholesale clientele who we serve seven days a week. Therefore, we had to move without stopping operation. There needed to be a virtual duplicate of everything at our new location and at the old. Our staff would work up to a point, then we would load up the trucks, move, reload and start production again. There was a period of 36-48 hours when the bulk of our staff worked around the clock. We can’t really tell a hotel we can’t serve their breakfast because we are moving.”

Heart of America Realtor-Melanie Stenerson, Director of Marketing: “Moving has been a very positive experience for us. We are in a brand new building that was designed for our business. It has had an extremely positive effect on our associates because it is better equipped for meeting and there is more space.”

Dr. Daniel J. Beer Family Dentistry-Heidi Porter, Front Office Manager: We just didn’t have enough space. The space we have now is 2 or 3 times bigger than our old office and there is room for growth. The move has definitely improved things. It has brought new patients to us because of advertising our move. And because we moved into a business area, we have gotten the attention of businesses around us, bringing in new patents. I think it has also had a positive effect on our patients. They have more room and they think it is a lot prettier than our old location. Our employees seem much happier because they are not in close quarters as they were before.”