Now that Sault Tribe management is out of the picture, Greektown is finally making money. Were we making money all along and didn’t know it? Where did it go? If Greektown’s revenues are up 11.8% over last year while the other 2 casinos in Detroit are down an average of 25% or more, which is representative of casinos all across the country, doesn’t this raise some questions in everyone’s mind. Even those that are clueless when it comes to doing the math are scratching their heads over this one. Add the 11.8 % increase to what the other casinos are down…an average 25% decrease over last year. That’s almost 37%. I spent 25 years examining and calculating budgets and doing comparisons of budget to actual, prior years, and projected sales, profits and expenses so I can’t help but have a couple of raised eyebrows over the calculations I just did.
Let me try to explain this. A manager I worked for continually added inventory counts to reported promotional sales and markdown figures which recorded a loss in profit. He did it to cover waste so that at the end of the year, he would come out smelling like a rose and get a big bonus for controlling waste. Trouble is, inventory figures, and cover-ups, roll over to the next year’s business just like your unused cell phone minutes. The following year’s inventory count reflects last year’s cover-up plus the current years normal expected waste figures. Waste is inevitable and the result of human error, undetected shoplifting, and employee theft with 1% and under as the goal.
So this manager thought he had a great year showing a 5% gain instead of a loss, which could only happen as the result of a huge mistake. He tried to explain it away by claiming the inventory of the prior year, before he got there, was in error. He was fired.
Now reverse the scenario....While the manager wanted to look good so he could get that top bonus, a corporaton would never report more profits than they earned. It would be stupid and cost them in corporate taxes. If a corporation wanted to pay less taxes, they would report less profit using a seperate set of books. If an owner of a large company wanted more money in his pocket, he might be inclined to show less profit and a loss would be even better. But of course, this scenario would assume that the owner of the large company was crooked, dishonest….a thief. Now imagine if this company had stockholders. They just got ripped off.
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Changing the subject and just as a reminder, why did Bernard Bouschor go to extraordinary lengths to get back on the Sault Tribe board? Prior to the last election, why did Cathy Abramson, DJ Hoffman, Lana Causley, Joe Eitrem, Dennis McKelvie and who am I missing, fight so hard to get Aaron Payment away from Greektown and replace him with the ousted police chief who wasn’t qualified to run an outhouse let alone a casino? Hmmmmm…….2 + 2+?=??…
Let me try to explain this. A manager I worked for continually added inventory counts to reported promotional sales and markdown figures which recorded a loss in profit. He did it to cover waste so that at the end of the year, he would come out smelling like a rose and get a big bonus for controlling waste. Trouble is, inventory figures, and cover-ups, roll over to the next year’s business just like your unused cell phone minutes. The following year’s inventory count reflects last year’s cover-up plus the current years normal expected waste figures. Waste is inevitable and the result of human error, undetected shoplifting, and employee theft with 1% and under as the goal.
So this manager thought he had a great year showing a 5% gain instead of a loss, which could only happen as the result of a huge mistake. He tried to explain it away by claiming the inventory of the prior year, before he got there, was in error. He was fired.
Now reverse the scenario....While the manager wanted to look good so he could get that top bonus, a corporaton would never report more profits than they earned. It would be stupid and cost them in corporate taxes. If a corporation wanted to pay less taxes, they would report less profit using a seperate set of books. If an owner of a large company wanted more money in his pocket, he might be inclined to show less profit and a loss would be even better. But of course, this scenario would assume that the owner of the large company was crooked, dishonest….a thief. Now imagine if this company had stockholders. They just got ripped off.
.................................................................................
Changing the subject and just as a reminder, why did Bernard Bouschor go to extraordinary lengths to get back on the Sault Tribe board? Prior to the last election, why did Cathy Abramson, DJ Hoffman, Lana Causley, Joe Eitrem, Dennis McKelvie and who am I missing, fight so hard to get Aaron Payment away from Greektown and replace him with the ousted police chief who wasn’t qualified to run an outhouse let alone a casino? Hmmmmm…….2 + 2+?=??…
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