How a Family Business Recovered $2M – The Key to Ending Costly Turnover
When you’re short-staffed, it’s easy to feel like hiring “anyone who can fog a mirror” is better than leaving a shift uncovered. But for one family business, that mindset was costing them more than $2 million a year in turnover and burning out their team.
Like many businesses, they believed their biggest problem was simply finding enough people to keep the doors open. “We don’t have a hiring problem,” their HR manager said. “We can hire anyone we want, they just don’t stay.”
The Problem: Hiring Without Culture Fit
The company’s HR manager believed they didn’t have a hiring problem because they could always fill roles. But those hires didn’t stick. Turnover was constant, morale was low, and managers were overwhelmed.
Betsi Bixby, founder of Meridian Associates, helped the company see what was really happening. The cost of turnover… from overtime, burnout, and constant hiring was killing their profitability. But it wasn’t inevitable.
After calculating the staggering cost of turnover, they realized they had to stop hiring warm bodies and start hiring for culture fit.
The Solution: Slow Down to Speed Up
With guidance from Meridian, they took these steps:
- Defined and applied their core values to hiring decisions
- Added situational screening questions to spot the right fit
- Streamlined the hiring process and centralized screening
- Trained managers on how to lead and support their teams
- Revamped onboarding to remove surprises and build confidence
- Introduced pay-for-performance to reward high achievers
The Results: Real Change in 30 Days and Full Employment in 18 Months
Within the first month, the company saw improvement. Over time, turnover dropped, profitability increased, and their culture became a magnet for employees who shared their values and work ethic.
By investing in their people and refusing to accept high turnover as “just the way it is,” they proved that even in retail, a strong culture can solve your toughest hiring challenges.
If you want to hear the full conversation about this inspiring journey and get actionable insights you can use in your own family business listen to the full podcast episode here on the Family Business Breakthroughs podcast.
