Finance industry veteran praises Silo Capital for expanding his businesses profit margins
Case Study
No Pain, Only Gain for NYC Tropical House
“With Silo’s financial backing we could - overnight - negotiate better purchasing prices with our suppliers and expand profit margins.”
Manny Concepcion
Owner and CEO at NYC Tropical House Inc.
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NYC Tropical House Inc.
NYC Tropical House Inc. is located in the Bronx, New York, surrounded by a rich latino community. For a decade, they have served as a one stop shop for quality tropical produce, specializing in plantains, yams, yuca, and banana varietals from Costa Rica and Ecuador. Their customer service and commitment to quality have attracted the attention of customers across the five boroughs and beyond.
Location
Bronx, New York, USA
Team Size
45
Their Goals
Manny Concepcion seeks to find stable growth for NYC Tropical House Inc. and ready his business for the next generation of produce. NYC Tropical House prioritizes the growth and well-being of its employees and within a few years, they hope to expand into new distribution locations and customer markets along the East Coast.
Special ingredient to share
Green Plantains
Mangu or Mashed Plantains: A home town Dominican tropical treat
Ingredients
- 3 green plantains
- ¾ teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup water, at room temperature
- 2 tablespoons butter, unsalted
Instructions
- Peel the plantains and cut lengthwise, then divide each half into two.
- Add the plantains to a pot and boil in enough water to cover them until they are very tender. Add salt to the water before the water breaks the boil.
- Remove the plantains from the water and mash them right away with a fork until they are very smooth and there are few to no lumps. Mix in butter, and water. Keep mashing and mixing until smooth.
NYC Tropical House Inc. uses Silo Capital and Silo insights to Expand Profit Margins and Reinvest in Themselves
The Challenge
As a former financial professional, Manny Concepcion knew how to position his business, NYC Tropical House Inc., to compete in New York. Strong supplier relationships. A specialized product line. The ability to maximize his profit margins at every opportunity and avoid growth-slowing costs. To do this, Manny knew he needed to leverage outside financing, yet as a formal financial professional, he wasn’t impressed by the substandard options available to the produce industry.
The Solution
Unlike other financial providers, Silo Capital was excited to work closely with NYC Tropical House Inc. to develop a solution tailored to their unique needs. Manny leveraged Silo Instant Pay to pay his suppliers earlier and negotiate better rates and instantly boosted his profit margins. Soon, Manny began investing newly available funds into infrastructure necessary to grow his business. Silo software gave profit and loss insights that helped NYC Tropical make better decisions.
Silo Instant Pay gives us the freedom to make certain purchases at the right time - and timing is everything in this business.
The Results
Increased profit margins by 5%
Silo’s Instant Pay program gave NYC Tropical House the ability to pay their suppliers upfront, increasing buying power that resulted in discounted rates and higher quality products.
Speedy infrastructure investment
The increased profit and growth that Silo’s Instant Pay program unlocked led to their accelerated acquisition of new business assets, including 5 new trucks, production machinery, and one trailer back.
Real insight into profit and loss
Silo’s inventory management and accounting software gave NYC Tropical House the ability to see the full picture of their costs. This data guided them on making more informed decisions for their buying and selling operations.
Read the Full Story
Silo's Capital and Inventory solutions help NYC Tropical House expand their profit margins
After years of learning strategic financial management in the finance industry, Manny had developed a deep understanding of how to build NYC Tropical House Inc., his Bronx based wholesale produce business, the right way in order to maximize their earning potential.
Manny chose to specialize in supplying tropical produce like yuca, banana, and plantains because he understood the unique demand for Caribbean and South American cuisine in New York communities. However, since Manny got his start in produce a decade ago, finding supply at a good price has remained a challenge. “Because of the distance,” Manny explained, “most suppliers abroad don’t feel comfortable issuing lines of credit to American wholesalers, so we have to pay for orders in advance.”
Week over week, paying suppliers in large upfront sums would diminish NYC Tropical House’s available working capital, until of course, they could sell the product. However, the shipping, processing and selling process often took weeks, so NYC Tropical House felt limited in what they could afford to purchase in the meantime.
If you pay slow, you pay more
Without a comfortable arsenal of resources, NYC Tropical House lacked the firepower they wanted to negotiate better rates with their suppliers. Suppliers in the produce business often charged companies like NYC Tropical House a premium in exchange for extended repayment terms. Due to their own customers’ lengthy term agreements that constrained their cash flow, NYC Tropical House felt they had no choice but to accept these premiums.
And these choppy cash flow cycles kept eating into their profit margins.
Soon, Manny decided enough was enough and began to strategically search for outside financing, but he wasn’t impressed by what he found available to the perishables industry. Banks and industry factoring companies were no doubt a poor fit for Manny who disliked their one-size-fits-all policies that required complex application processes and relationship-straining collections services.
So many financial providers are so rigid with how they do things but this business is very delicate...Businesses like mine are protective of their operations and their clients.
The best part about Silo’s capital program is the flexibility. With Silo, we worked together to fit the solution to our needs.
Silo, a breath of fresh air
NYC Tropical House was initially introduced to Silo through Manny’s sons, Anthony and Alan, who helped their father run the family business and were always on the lookout for ways to modernize. When Manny sat down with the Silo Capital team, he could tell Silo was different.
After his time working on Wall Street, Manny was used to the harshness and rigidity characteristic of financing companies, but to his surprise, he immediately felt listened to. “The best part about Silo’s capital program is the flexibility. With Silo, we worked together to fit the solution to our needs,” Manny explained.
NYC Tropical House would soon sign on for Silo Instant Pay, which gave them the working capital they needed to buy more products at a greater frequency.
“Silo Instant Pay comes in as a great help,” said Manny. “Now I can sell and immediately generate the capital needed to meet pre pay agreements for suppliers.” Now equipped with fast and flexible lines of supply, the NYC Tropical House team began to unlock more sales revenues.
If you want to keep growing, you need capital to keep buying
When I compare profit and loss reporting across programs, Silo is the best. It’s quick and clean and allows you to see everything that you need in one place.
Increase profits without lifting a finger
Funds made available via Silo Instant Pay also gave NYC Tropical House the confidence to negotiate better rates with their suppliers.
With funds comfortably accessible, NYC Tropical House could use early payment agreements as leverage with suppliers to negotiate down their price of goods.
“Silo Instant Pay gives us the freedom to make certain purchases at the right time - and timing is everything in this business,” Manny explains. “With Silo’s financial backing we could - overnight - negotiate better purchasing prices with our suppliers and expand profit margins.”
In just 7 months, NYC Tropical House reported increasing their profit margins by a whopping 5 percentage points.
Silo Inventory and Accounting software would ultimately be implemented to optimize NYC Tropical House’s operations and give them additional money saving business tools that Quickbooks couldn’t.
“When I compare profit and loss reporting across programs, Silo is the best. It’s quick and clean and allows you to see everything that you need in one place,” said Alan Concepcion, Director of Sales. “And now with the right insight, these numbers are always going to back up our decisions.” With Silo's system in place, NYC Tropical House could now make information based decisions and continue to save money where it mattered most.
A new approach to an age old problem
As a finance industry and produce industry veteran, Manny admitted that when he encountered Silo, he was surprised. “Silo has their own unique method of doing business that I think stood out to so many people in this industry. Silo has a great team that listens,” Manny concluded. Alan Concepcion, Manny’s son, put it a little differently.
Silo is designed for produce, so they get it.
