John Ferchill

                                          

John Ferchill, CEO of The Ferchill Group, shared some of his wisdom with us last week. People that know John Ferchill say he’s tough, delivers on his word, and gets things done. He built his entire company on loyalty and is very proud of that fact.

Ferchill has had a phenomenal success at finding niches. For example, Ferchill knew that people wanted nice, expensive housing within his niche, downtown Detroit. There was a high demand, but low supply. So Ferchill built 65 condos downtown for a sale price of $500,000 each. He sold 40 of the 65 in a matter of hours during the first day. Not only is this absolutely amazing, but Ferchill’s company managed to do this quality business with a team of 9 people.

Ferchill and his staff are relentless for finishing jobs on time and on budget. One thing I find fascinating is that his company does no marketing. He has created such a strong reputation for himself through his excellent business practices that he hasn’t had the need for marketing. He either finds his customers or they find him, mostly through word of mouth. Through following his niche and practicing effective business techniques, Ferchill has had only one failure out of his 75 projects and it was due to the market.

Ferchill’s one piece of advice to budding entrepreneurs is to “live up to your word and always be straightforward.” Ferchill definitely “eats his own dog food.” He tells it how it is. “Everyone may not like me,” he says, “but they will certainly have respect for me and want to do business with me.” In Ferchill’s eyes, clients are far more important than friends.

“People only want to be associated with people that are successful.” And therefore, people want to associate themselves with John Ferchill.