Catalogers of the Year

Says Masterman: “We simply remove all the barriers to ordering from Headsets.com.”

Opportunities and Challenges

With success inevitably comes growing pains, and Headsets.com is no exception. Says Faith, “We need to manage the pace of our growth, whether it’s through systems, resources or premises. We have to over-specify up front and live with the extra for a while in order to have that over-capacity when we need it.”

To that end, the company recently moved into a larger facility. “We’re growing quickly, doubling in size every 18 to 24 months,” Faith explains. That leads to another challenge: cash flow. The company took only one small round of financing in 2000, and has been self-financed since then. “It’s harder to grow this way,” he admits, “but it’s the right policy for us.”

The difficulty, he says, is that growth — while encouraging — also can be “a constant distraction to what we do, which is sell headsets.” Still, growth is hard to pass up for one as entrepreneurial as Faith. Recently the company began shipping products to Canada, its first foray into international markets. “We’re seeing promising results,” says Faith. “We don’t treat Canada like it’s just another state, like other U.S. marketers tend to,” he notes. “We did some research on how Canadians want to be treated, and we think we found the right approach.”

With his relentless pursuit of superior customer service and his methodical approach to sound corporate growth, Mike Faith of Headsets.com exemplifies the savvy merchant most catalogers strive to become. Catalog Success is proud to present the 2005 B-to-B Cataloger of the Year Award to Mike Faith, president and founder, Headsets.com.