SJC Drums

SJC Drums on The Profit

Custom Drum Sets - Season 3 Premiere - May 12, 2015

Custom Made Drum Sets
SJC Drums seen on
The Profit Season 3 Premiere Episode
 The Host of The Profit Show Marcus Lemonis started Season 3 Premiere Episode with the SJC Custom Drum Set Business. Lemonis decides to meet Chris and Mike Ciprari, for the first time at the National Association of Music Merchants. He quickly learns a custom made drum set costs around $6000,00 each.

Now you'd think with a high price tag you could get a drum set made in a matter of days, but, in fact, their running six to seven Months out. Marcus gets right to the point when he says, "It's ridiculous, you can build a yacht in 6 Months, you can build a plane in 6 Months". They have an excellent product, but the process seems to be completely broken. To make matters worse, The Profit Star learns SJC Drums are operating on 15% margins directly relating back to the process.

The name SJC Drums is Mike's Brothers initials standing for Scott James Ciprari. The business was started by the two brothers 15 years ago with Scott being the chief designer making custom drums. He may have founded the company, but was bought out three years ago because the brothers could no longer function as a team.


Marcus finally goes to the SJC Drum Shop just outside Boston, Mass. and quickly discovers the process is even worse than he first expected. He then goes into the office and see's a stack of checks that need to be sent out, but no money in the bank to cover them. They are not even sure SJC Drums can make next week's payroll.

Now at this point a lot of Shark investors would probably run away or at the very least, try to take majority control of the business. The numbers showed a million dollars in sales last year, but over $300,000.00 in debt. Gross margins are around 20% and still losing $200k on a $1 million in sales. Chris, an employee of SJC Drums, knows the numbers inside out and makes an excellent impression with Marcus. On top of all this debt, Mike also bought his brother Scott out of the business for $535,000.00 with a $2k payment every month and a balloon payment for $285,000.00 after 15 years.

As bad as the numbers look The Profit Star stills see's the profit potential for SJC Drums. Lemonis offers $400,000,00 for a 33% equity stake in the business, and another 33% of SJC Drums going to the head employee Chris, who's demonstrated he deserves to be part-owner. With Marcus now 100% in charge, he gets busy on re-designing new categories for the SJC Drums with a good, better and best line-up. The entry level drum price is established at $895.00 and with a 40% markup, the team gets busy designing a set they can build for $537.00 each.

Marcus then turns his attention to Scott, the innovator of the company that still carries his name. It's been three years since the brother have seen each other and Scott clearly is still upset how he left the business he founded. To fix the "people" part of The Profits "People, Process and Product" success formula, Lemonis realizes he needs Chris's help to turn this business around. The two Brothers finally meet, and it turns into the most awkward few moments in all The Profit Shows. Marcus finally gets them talking, but clearly he's having second thoughts if this was a good idea. They finally do talk and at least come to an agreement trying to put the past behind them.

The next day Scott comes back to SJC Drums and quickly proves he's still full of great drum making ideas and knows the material numbers inside out. Within a week, they have a prototype for the new "good" design built exactly for the $537.00 needed for a 40% markup.

After Marcus completely redesigned the process, SJC Drums went from making 40 custom drum sets a month to over 100 sets. Now instead of waiting 7 or 8 months for an order to be completed they'll do it in a matter of days.

With the people and process firmly in place, The Profit Star turns his attention to the new product line for SJC Drums. Marcus schedules an appointment with music store Sam Ash with over 50 retail locations. The owners don't seem very interested in carrying a new drum sets line with several negatives stated right away. Mike overcomes all of them with positive responses and finally closes the deal. Marcus looks very, very impressed.

SJC Drums after The Profit Show Update


The Profit Season 3 Premiere with SJC Drums revealed another side of Marcus Lemonis not seen in the first two seasons. The people, process and product success formula The Profit Star always begins with the "people" first. In some cases, as demonstrated on the SJC Drum Episode, an enormous part of Marcus's success is his ability bringing the right people together no matter how difficult that part of the process might be.

After the new process was in place production can now grow to over $1.8 million in sales, doubling the numbers before The Profit Show. Marcus also helped SJC Drums get a licensing deal with The School of Rock along with a scholarship fund now in place.

All in all, The Profit Season 3 Premiere is one of the most memorable episode's ever seen on the Show. If there's one main lesson to be learned, it's that the people are above and beyond your greatest asset for long-term success.

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