1. 減少專屬辦公座位

????私人辦公空間是項花費很高的支出。約翰?德哈特是家庭保健提供商鄰家護士公司（Nurse Next Door）的聯合首席執行官。去年，該公司位于溫哥華的總部員工從28人增加到了45人，但辦公空間卻縮小了。他們是如何做到的？秘訣在于：他們按照先到先得的原則給員工分配座位。“就連我本人也沒有自己專屬的辦公桌，”德哈特稱。僅此一項，該公司就節約了6萬美元的租賃費以及4萬美元的IT基礎設施成本。

2.加快商品流通

????為什么一定要等產品入庫后才開始著手促銷工作？總部位于達拉斯的Driversselect公司的創始人兼總裁史蒂夫?霍爾通過拍賣采購二手汽車。一旦拍賣成交，他馬上就開始在自己的網站上兜售這些汽車，而不是等到這些車到貨時才動手銷售。結果舊車在其車庫中的停留時間從44天縮短到了36天，每月節省利息、保險、以及庫存成本1.44萬美元。他還表示，2011年，該公司的銷售額已近9,100萬美元，簡直就像“舊車銷售行業的Zappos（美國最大的鞋業銷售網站——譯注）”。

3.公用事業收費也要討價還價

????人們很容易認為，公共事業費用等日常開支沒有討價還價的余地。李?普羅森尼亞克打理著位于丹佛的舞蹈培訓機構櫻桃溪舞公司（Cherry Creek Dance），他每個月都要收到康卡思特公司（Comcast）的電話賬單，苦不堪言。于是他要求電話公司降低費率，幾分鐘后他的要求就得到了滿足。對于多數其他日常支出，他也如法炮制。如此一來，該機構每月的成本支出降低了1,650美元。2010年，該公司的營業收入達到了160萬美元。“每次，我們都能通過協商，拿到更劃算的價格，”普羅森尼亞克稱。

4.降低借記卡交易手續費

????獸醫整形外科及運動醫學集團（Veterinary Orthopedic & Sports Medicine Group）位于馬里蘭州的安納波利斯章克申。這家營利性診所的創始人之一、杰森?卡納普變更了公司的交易處理機構，為公司節省了3萬美元。“交易處理其實是我們每天都要用到的服務項目，”卡納普說。這家公司目前的年銷售額為650萬美元。此外，他還要求借記卡用戶在袖珍鍵盤上手動輸入個人身份號碼，而不是直接刷卡，于是又額外節省了1%的交易成本。

5.嘗試云服務

????許多企業主至今仍然對托管敏感數據心存疑慮。精華翻譯公司（Choice Translating）在夏洛特市和秘魯的利馬市都設有辦公機構，該公司正是由于采用了數據托管服務，每年能節省下3.3萬美元的資金。因為他們就無需再支持7臺服務器和兩個防火墻，該公司的聯合所有者弗農?梅納德三世亦無需再支付每年1.56萬美元的IT支持成本。這家公司節省的其他開支還包括：后臺支持費用降低；電費減少；不再出現因軟硬件問題而引起的宕機，等于延長了有效工作時間。

????——Verne Harnish是執行教育機構Gazelles公司的首席執行官。

????譯者：大海

1. Ditch assigned seating

????Private offices are an expensive addiction. Ask John DeHart, co-CEO of home health care provider Nurse Next Door. The company reduced office space while expanding from 28 people to 45 at its Vancouver headquarters last year. How? By making all desks available on a first-come, first-served basis. "Even I don't have my own desk," says DeHart. The company saved $60,000 in rent and $40,000 in IT infrastructure costs.

2. Sell faster

????Why wait until products are in stock to promote them? Steve Hall, founder and president of Dallas's Driversselect, peddles the used cars on his website from the moment he purchases them at auction instead of waiting till they're delivered. That cuts the time cars sit in his lots from 44 to 36 days, saving $14,400 a month on interest, insurance, and storage. Sales at the company which he says is like "a Zappos for used cars" are on pace to reach $91 million in 2011.

3. Ask for a better deal

????It's easy to fall into the mindset that routine expenses like utilities are nonnegotiable. Frustrated by the monthly cable bill at Denver's Cherry Creek Dance, Lee Prosenjak asked Comcast for lower rates and got them minutes later. Doing the same with most recurring bills, he reduced monthly costs by $1,650 at the firm, which had more than $1.6 million in revenue for 2010. "We negotiated a better rate every single time," he says.

4. Reduce debit card fees

????Jason Canapp saved $30,000 at Veterinary Orthopedic & Sports Medicine Group in Annapolis Junction, Md., by changing transaction-processing firms. "It really is a commoditized service," says Canapp, a founder of the profitable clinic, with about $6.5 million in annual sales. He took advantage of an offer to shave another 1% off transaction costs by getting debit card users to enter their PINs on a keypad instead of swiping them.

5. Try the cloud

????Many business owners are still uneasy about hosting sensitive data off-site. But it's brought savings of almost $33,000 annually to Choice Translating, which has offices in Charlotte and Lima, Peru. Since getting rid of seven servers and two firewalls, co-owner Vernon Menard III no longer pays $15,600 annually for IT support. Other savings: cheaper backups, lower electric bills, and no downtime caused by hardware and software problems.

????--Verne Harnish is the CEO of Gazelles Inc., an executive education firm.