Bern Fly Rod Company is a small manu- facturer of high-quality graphite fly-fishing rods. It sells its products to fly-fishing throughout the United States and Canada. began as a small company with four salespeople, a family members of the owner. Due to the popularity and recent growth of fly-fishing, Bern now employs a sales force of 16, and for the first time employs nonfam ily members. The salespeople travel around the country giving fly-casting demos of their new models. Once the sales orders are gener- ated, inventory availability is determined and if necessary, the salesperson sends the order directly to the manufacturing department
for immediate production. Sales staff com pensation is tied directly to their sales figures. Bern's financial statements for the December year-end reflect unprecedented sales, 35 percent higher than last year. Further, sales for December account for 40 percent of all sales. Last year, December sales accounted for only 20 percent of all sales.