'Fast Track' firms scored wins in '96; a few hit speed bumps.

Companies on the fast track don't always stay there.

Market forces, management changes and a host of other unexpected developments can plunge the most promising firms into oblivion.

Each week, the Business Journal profiles a company on the way up. Now, at year's end, we took a look back to see how some of them are faring.

Several of the firms have hit stumbling blocks, and not all are meeting their expectations. But most of the businesses surveyed are still on track, and to a firm their executives are confident of success in 1997.

Gary Clark predicted early this year that his West Los Angeles-based Clark Information Systems Inc. would make $4.3 million in revenues for 1996. Instead, the company outdid projections and pulled in $5.4 million.

CIS designs software used to store and process reams of information - products that are mostly aimed at major corporations.

This past year, payroll expanded from 40 employees to 48 with the hiring of six computer programmers and two marketing executives.

Demand is so good, said Clark, that he had to turn down up to $100,000 in business a month. "It hurts to do that," he said, "but it's much worse to over-extend yourself."

Driving the expansion is the national consolidation of health maintenance organizations, many of which are either based in Southern California or have a major presence here.

Clark said an accompanying consolidation of HMO computer systems is providing 80 percent of his business.

Trying to diversify a customer base, Clark signed a "very large contract" with a Southern California oil company in November. He declined to name the company, citing competitive reasons.

"Our major challenge at the moment is the shortage of available talent to fill the positions we have opening up," said Clark, who added that he expects to double his workforce to 96 by the end of next year.

As an indicator of the challenge in attracting and holding onto talent, a company-hired masseuse visits CIS each week and everybody gets a free 15-minute massage.

A few long city blocks away from CIS, Westwood-based BoxTop Interactive Inc., a computer web site developer, had a more mixed performance in 1996.

On a positive note, the workforce grew to 58 employees (up from 35 in April) and BoxTop moved to its new 16,000 square-foot corporate headquarters in the Saban Building in Westwood.

But the company is falling short, of the $8 million in revenues projected for the year, said Lisa Janzen, BoxTop senior vice president.

"We're grossing up to $500,000 a month," Janzen said.

Also, late this summer, BoxTop executives parted ways with Charles Como, the company's co-founder. Janzen would not provide any specifics, saying that "creative differences" over the future direction of the company caused the split.

BoxTop plans to hire another 17 programmers and graphics designers this spring, and signed an important array of new customers in 1996.

Among others, BoxTop is currently designing a channel of programming for Microsoft's multi-channel Web site scheduled for launch this March, developing a gateway for UCLA's 200-plus Web sites and producing a CD-ROM for AT&T.

Operating in an industry where fads and customers come and go as fast as you can say "pan-blackened red fish," the restaurant chain Grill Concepts Inc. continued on its path of steady growth last year with its American fare.

Though a planned acquisition of the bankrupt Hamburger Hamlet chain didn't come to pass, West L.A.-based Grill Concepts added one more Daily Grill to its roster in Irvine last September.

The company currently owns and operates eight Daily Grills in Southern California and The Grill in Beverly Hills, the company's more expensive flagship. It also has three Pizzeria Unos on the East Coast.

In late January, another Daily Grill is scheduled to open at Los Angeles International Airport and by March its first East Coast restaurant opens in Washington, D.C.

Grill Concepts exceeded its 1996 revenue target of $20 million by $4 million, according to president Bob Spivak, who predicted $32 million in revenues for the coming year.

Flying high in 1995 and into the first quarter of 1996, Dove Audio Inc. of Beverly Hills subsequently hit some major turbulence that sucked air out of the bottom line.

In June, company executives predicted $50 million in revenues. But by mid-December president and co-founder Michael Viner estimated the final figure would be closer to $30 million.

"It's been a hectic year," said Viner, "but we're past the worst of it."

Dove Audio is a producer of audio books, as well as a book publisher, TV and feature film production company, CD-ROM developer, record label and distributor of all of the above.

Viner said the poor performance was due to higher-than-expected costs associated with the acquisition of Four Point Entertainment and some heavy returns of Faye Resnick's O.J. Simpson trial-related book "Nicole Brown Simpson: A Private Diary." Viner said 400,000 of the 450,000 volume printing were returned unsold.

Also recently, Dove Four Point's syndicated TV strips "Scoop With Sam and Dorothy" and "The Bradshaw Difference" were canceled.

"They've been in some trouble this past year, no question," said Lew Alton, president of L.H. Alton, an investment bank based in San Francisco. Adding to the problems was a planned $10 million infusion that failed to materialize.

But things could be looking up with the Larry Flynt autobiography "An Unseemly Man," scheduled for release at the time of the opening of the new $40 million Oliver Stone movie on the same subject.

The $16 million sales year The Sheridan Group had in 1995 may have raised the bar a bit too high, according to Dannine Sheridan, owner of the downtown-based business furniture firm.

"It was a bit of an anomaly," said Sheridan, noting that $6 million of that came from one contract - furnishing the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's 750,000 square-foot Gateway Center at Union Station.

Even without a similarly huge contract, Sheridan predicts that her company will have generated close to that figure by the time the books are closed on 1996. "It has been a very good year," she said.

With some large projects for Dream-Works SKG, Warner Bros. and Showtime Viacom under her belt, Sheridan said she has a comfortable backlog of work that will extend well into 1997. That, plus the recent signing of a contract with a large financial services company, should keep revenues steady.

While Dannine Sheridan is hoping to furnish your office, Charles Mitchell is aiming to frame your home pictures.

Since its founding in 1990, FrameStore Inc. of Santa Monica has rapidly grown from a single location to a 10-store chain with an estimated $10 million in annual sales.

"We're doing very well," said Mitchell. 'We're beginning to get some brand recognition in the marketplace."

Mitchell said that as of mid-December, frame sales were 35 percent above his beginning-of-year predictions. Because of economies of scale, FrameStores' frame costs have also declined 26 percent. He declined to specify actual revenue numbers and profits.

In 1997, Mitchell said he plans to open more Southern California locations. Financing is in place for six stores and leases had been signed on three.

"I want to build a 25-store chain in Los Angeles," said Mitchell. "Then I'll think about expanding into other parts of the region."

For their part, EZ Lube Inc. owners Mike Dobson and Rick Teasta have expansion on their minds too. The owners moved the company from the South Bay to Newport Beach, to better position themselves for expansion in the Orange County market.

EZ Lube now has six stores in Los Angeles County and three in Orange County, but plans to open seven new stores in Orange County in 1997.

Revenue in 1996 was markedly better than 1995 - up 15 percent from $4.5 million to $5.2 million, says Teasta. Employment rolls also rose from 106 to 130.

Teasta and Dobson founded EZ Lube in 1988 when they bought an independent oil-change station in Lawndale. Despite the current expansion, the 50-50 partners said that they'll never sell EZ Lube franchises.

"We like customer service," said Teasta. "We want to be the Nordstroms of the oil-change business."