Hiatt Printing's campus location has had no complaints this month after closing on a business day for the first time since its opening in 1986.
"We're still doing some transitioning," owner Chris Hiatt said. "We're working out the kinks."
He said he planned and weighed his options for several weeks before making a tough decision to decrease business hours to 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. every day of the week instead of remaining open 24 hours a day. He said the change would improve sales figures and efficiency.
National and local economics and negative sales during the third shift, which was midnight to 8 a.m., were the driving factors in the decision, he said.
"The numbers to sustain a 24-hour operation hasn't been there for years," Hiatt said. "I've struggled safely with it for the last five or six years. It's time to start being more frugal."
He said the campus location never finished a fiscal year in the red, but two or three customers on average during the third shift every day had negative results and didn't justify keeping the store open 24 hours.
Hiatt said he realized the average two or three customers might be inconvenienced, but the new business hours are reasonable accommodations for customers. He said he would listen to complaints if anyone had any because the Ball State University community is the overwhelming majority of the business at the campus location.
"It's still good exposure for customers to patronize our environment," he said.
The positive aspect of the cutback is that he didn't have to fire anyone, he said. Hiatt knew two employees were planning to quit for other reasons before the transition, so he decided to change the hours at that time to avoid firing employees. He said it was unfortunate that two full-time jobs were lost with the cutback.
Hiatt gave the third shift staff ample notice that their hours would be redistributed throughout remaining business hours, he said.
"None of the employee workforce expressed any issue with what had transpired," he said. "They knew the sales numbers."
Former employee Mike Longfellow said he quit before the cutback to move to Connecticut. None of the employees had any complaints about the change because they would still have enough hours because two people were leaving, he said.
"It was kind of ridiculous to have it open," he said. "People would ask me why we would stay open when I worked nights."
Hiatt said he hasn't ruled out the possibility of expanding business hours back to 24 hours. He has plans to renovate the campus location this summer and add 50 percent more floor space. He said he will revisit the issue then.
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