“I have had the pleasure of working with Mike Stone and his associates for more than five years.
“Mike possesses a rare combination of skills. He is at once personable, astute, savvy, communicative, and customer-focused while also being technically adept, quick to grasp complex challenges, and strategic. He has a strong commitment to action which delivers meaningful results for the projects and the people with which he works. And he is very good at managing to budget and timelines.
“Most recently, I have worked closely with Mike to create and launch a brand. This work involved a deep understanding of multiple and diverse customer and stakeholder needs, sophisticated research and analysis, the ability to build consensus, and problem solving to identify and work towards the best solutions.
“Working with Mike adds incredible value (and fun) to any strategic organizational initiative!”
I Marketing Group Manager, Federal Business Assistance Program
“Working with the team at Stone & Associates for over 15 years has been a tremendous asset to [our organization].
“Stone & Associates has worked on a broad range of projects for [us] including: developing and deploying programs focused on growth, innovation and export assistance, conducting research related to competing with low cost countries, and writing detailed reports on the importance of exporting for small and medium sized manufacturers.
“For years, the team has also helped [us] to develop marketing materials including blogs, infographics and client testimonial videos. These items have helped take [our] marketing to another level!
“The long-term relationship we have had with Stone & Associates has truly been a benefit to [our] organization.”
I Growth Services Manager and Communications Manager, Federal Business Assistance Program
“The U.S. Export Assistance Center and the Maryland District Export Council have utilized Stone & Associates repeatedly to deliver the best results for our clients.
“Mike Stone has repeatedly delivered outstanding international business development and strategy workshops with our most valued clients. Mike’s very engaging approach as well as his practical experience has enabled our clients to make progress and achieve results.
Stone & Associates’ contributions begin with program planning and do not stop. Mike and his team always deliver for us.”
Bill Burwell I Director, USCS- Baltimore
“Being a small enterprise with few resources, we needed someone to guide us through this strategic planning and development phase of our business.
Mike was able to provide us with the tools we needed to better narrow our focus and help us determine which industries and markets to target.
Mike worked with us to develop a set of strategic questions to gather market research from current and potential customers, as well as leaders in the industry; and guided us through the creation of our elevator pitches and product differentiators. We are now using this information to modify our long-term growth strategy.
In addition, his guidance and expertise has prepared us for two large international trade missions and helped us to identify potential distributors from five countries. His services have been invaluable and we owe much of our success to his support and direction.”
William L. Hermann I CEO, Haemo-Sol Intl, LLC
“I have known and worked closely with Mike Stone and his firm since
1997 on a number of different, mostly VMEC related contracts. I have also
had the good fortune to collaborate / work with Mike during the course of a number of manufacturing projects that he has executed through contracts with NIST MEP.
“Mike and the Stone & Associates team have always been a sincere pleasure to work with. Mike is true professional, honest and candid in all of his business dealings. He has always proved to be knowledgeable about the subject at hand and very resourceful. My … experience with Mike has been that he always delivers, fully meets all commitments in a timely fashion and he stays within budget.
“I have absolutely no hesitation about highly recommending Mike Stone and Stone & Associates, Inc. to you.”
Bob Zider I Director/CEO, Vermont Manufacturing Extension Center
“Stone & Associates is a national leader in understanding the issues that face small / medium manufacturers as they compete in the global economy.
“Their market driven approach to research and strategic planning proved invaluable to helping us expand our business…”
Jacques Koppel I Former CEO Minnesota Technology, Inc.
“Michael is an exceptional facilitator, teacher and a superlative export business developer. I recommend Michael without reservation to anyone seeking a savvy, results- oriented, personable business consultant.”
Moses Olaniran I Co-founder at SKUserve
“I want to thank you (Mike Stone) for all of the hard work. You did a great job, and because of that we will be able to get AIDS drugs to far more people, and we have established a procurement strategy for humanitarian causes that will have implications far beyond this particular contract.
“Our success was in no small measure due to the fact that you established such good relationships with the vendors and did excellent [cost] analytic work. …I am glad that you were able to be at President Clinton’s announcement of our success. Hopefully being able to see the work lead to such a great success made all the sacrifice worthwhile.”
Ira Magaziner I Vice Chairman and CEO of the Clinton Health Access Initiative
