Ross Aims to Maintain 28-Year Streak of Revenue Growth

In a recent interview with the Ottawa Business Journal, our CEO David Ross discussed how Ross has been weathering the challenges that have arisen as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. While conditions looked bleak at first, things are now looking up due to strong upward momentum.

Initial Response

As nearly every sports broadcast and live event was cancelled once the pandemic began, Ross began bracing for the worst. It seemed like our 28 consecutive years of revenue growth may be coming to an end. Ross Production Services, our mobile production division, lost all their business essentially overnight due to the lack of events to produce.

In response, our leadership team acted quickly, and all staff moved to a 4-day work week to preserve jobs in uncertainty. It soon became clear that sales had indeed dropped, but expenses fell by an even greater proportion. As a result, profits actually began rising instead of declining.

On the Upswing

As soon as the leadership team had good visibility of the new forecast, all staff were brought back to 100%. Ross Production Services saw their business begin roaring back once live events began to be rescheduled. The factory was shut down temporarily at first, but it’s now operating at 95%.

Speaking on the current outlook, David Ross had this to say: “We were up 30 per cent for the first half of the year. You even it out and we’re going to be pretty close to last year’s numbers. If we’re going to miss, it’s going to be by a couple of per cent, from what we’ve seen so far. It’s too close to call, but we’re still pushing for growth.” 

It’s going to be close, but we might still squeak in a growth year due to our strong upward momentum!