Good Morning, Gents!

SUCCESS!!

I’ve been in a coffee shop for about a year now. I do all right there, maybe a sale a month or so. I’ve been wanting to get my greeting cards in there, so that I could increase my sales to one a week or so. This worked unbelievably well at the gift shop I’m in. I’d like to see if it works here too. The problem is that this place has new owners. I bumped into what seems to be the lead owner once this year & that was just to get acquainted & make introductions & see if they still wanted to keep me & what not. Anyway, I’ve sent emails, but no reply. I’ve left messages with staff. I’ve tried to figure out their schedule, but it’s random. I was able to leave work early a few times to run down there & try to catch them in the morning. Twice I walked in just as they were leaving out the back. Last month, I left a greeting card for them to check out.

This job is all about patience. If I want something done tomorrow, I probably should’ve started a while back. And I don’t think that’s a bad thing, though it can be frustrating. But learning to adapt to this reality is a good thing. It teaches you to control your emotions. It denies you instant gratification, which probably increases your joy, as this long journey has ended successfully for me & is probably more sweet than if I had done this when I met her 6 months ago. It’s certainly more well earned now than it would’ve been then. I think it helps you make better decisions. If I want to see results faster, I can’t procrastinate, because the process will be long enough if I don’t procrastinate. It also dulls your desires. Wanting can lead you to impulsive behavior, missed opportunities, or abrasive behavior, which may botch your plans. Instead, patience teaches you to learn to be under control, recognize opportunities, & always be ready to go when they arise.

I finally ran into her again on Thursday! And actually, I know her from when she was a barista here before she became an owner. According to her, we met at another location, though I don’t recall, because I was probably taking inventory (one track mind & all). So, she knows me, likes me, & is familiar with my work. And she had no idea that I was wanting to talk to her. They changed email addresses without my knowledge. So, she said what’s your pitch? And I said that I see you carry greeting cards & wondered if you’d be willing to carry some of……………she said yes. Didn’t even let me get the pitch out, so I’m gonna give it to you, because d’mmit, somebody needs to hear it, I don’t make up pitches for the hell of it. I have 32 greeting card designs & I anticipated her accepting 5 or 6, so I handed her my samples. She asked if she could take them ALL. Shhhh…..uh, sure. Didn’t bother to even look at them. They’re beautiful, she said (probably remembering what they looked like at the other location). She’s really excited to see how they do there, because some people come in to look at the merchandise, & not even get coffee.

So, then I asked if she’d be willing to carry my merch at their other 2 locations. Yes. She said that they’re being more picky with who they carry. Apparently I make the cut, probably because my sales are not bad & appropriate for their locations & align with their vision. But I also wonder if our rapport has something to do with it. Kindness, politeness, courtesy, are never wasted. I know people tend to view them as weaknesses. It generally signals someone you can walk all over. Maybe take advantage of. Maybe it gives people the ick, I don’t know. But in my experience, they’ve never failed me. I think they’ve gotten me a lot further than the art alone would. And patience teaches you emotional control, so that you can maintain this kind, polite, courteous, respectful, cool disposition & not become pushy or abrasive, which may torpedo your goals.

Their other location is in my neighborhood, so that’ll be sweet, & their third location is in a hospital. I am BEYOND PUMPED to get in there! I’ve never been in a hospital before. But she’d like to turn that into more of a gift shop. It is very gratifying being able to participate in other people’s dreams, I guess, & help them to achieve their goals, while achieving my own. I think this is part of that rapport. She has a vision & can see possibilities with me or with what my products can provide. She is not the only one I’ve experienced this with, just the latest. It’s very gratifying.

This brings me up to 12 locations! And may be what propels sales over the summer. I did this in the gift shop back in January & it has been huge, so hopefully this does the exact same thing. In fact, I think I’ve told you my standard. If I had 20 locations that sold just 20 cards a month (nevermind everything else), I could do this full time. The gift shop sold 20 cards this month. That’s the first time that’s ever happened before. So, I have A LONG WAY to go, but it’s very exciting that things are moving in that direction. So, yeah, that was gonna be the pitch. The gift shop is just down the street from the coffee shop, so it worked there, hopefully, it works here, & the sales there have been ridiculous. Not to mention that the place where we allegedly met sold out the week of Mother’s Day. See, I was going to tell her all of this, but she beat me to the punch. Took the air right outta my sails.

The hospital they’re in is next to another hospital & across the street from a third, so I may walk into both & see if they would also be willing to carry some of my things. I’ve never had much success with walk-ins before, but I feel emboldened. And I’m hungry to expand. Every time I secure an account, I want another. But patience helps temper this, so that I don’t get in over my head (at least I think that’s what it does).

Which brings me to a conversation I had with a co-worker this week. He & I are both from small towns. He said that he’s surprised the restaurant in his little town is still open, because they don’t do well there. They don’t do well in my home town either. I remembered when I was in high school, there was this fantastic pizza place that opened. It was just a hole in the wall for an oven & they just did carry out & delivery. Best pizza you’ve ever had. Years later, she moved to a sit down location on Main Street. Maybe a dozen people could fit in there. Maybe 2 dozen. And that seemed to be a logical move to me, something both she should aspire to & the community should want. But then she moved again to a much bigger facility & it all went downhill. That’s what I know & what I say going forward, I don’t know, & am just speculating. I wonder if people start getting successful & then they’re offered credit & credit is a quicker way for them to make all their dreams come true. And they get in over their head. My co-worker said that maybe the costs became too much. My question is does this happen overnight? You’re going well & then you’re not suddenly? Or can you see the clouds on the horizon?

I think credit is a quick way to achieve your goals, but at the expense of what patience is teaching you. You invest $100 or $500 & sell everything at a profit & then you reinvest that profit & sell more at a profit & you just grow little by little. And you expand little by little. I’m hungry to grow, but patience makes sure I don’t grow faster than I can (maybe). If I can’t afford to expand, then I need to spend some time earning. Or maybe not expand at all for a while. But credit can allow me to expand without having to earn or save or even rethink things. I do not have credit, although the banks have started sending me offers. I have no desire to obtain credit, because I have come to value the lessons that patience has taught me. I think they are more valuable than credit.

Now I have a funny story for you, just because. It’s the end of the month, so I check some locations every week, some every other week, & some every month, depending on inventory, sales, etc. End of the month tends to align with me busting my arse & this month was no exception, with the holiday only compounding things (they don’t call it a hustle for nothing). Anyway, I went into the bookstore that just expanded a month or so ago. I’ve come to know the lady there. She’s pretty nice herself. She told me that she saw my things at another location (ironically, the location that the coffee shop owner first met me), because she lives in that area. She said she was looking for something for Mother’s Day & said I know this guy & bought some things there, which is funny, because I sell the same things at the bookstore, lol.

It’s just interesting where the relationships you build with people will go or take you. The gift store hired a staff this last year. One is a 19 year old girl. She actually worked for another place that I sell my things. She said that she saw my stuff out there, because her grandma was looking at them last fall, before she got hired on here. She says she always promotes my things there. Whether that’s true or not, I’m not sure, but I can tell you that sales are up. The staff at the coffee flower shop knows me very well too. I can honestly say that it feels like their staff becomes your staff, lol. And the 19 year old says that she’s hiding one of my items, because she wants to buy it. I always love it when owners hire staff, because I’ve learned that staff is good for business, lol. Something else that she said was that she has a lot of friends here & she doesn’t need any more. She’d rather be making friends from out of state. As someone who turns 47 next week, I can say that 1) you can never have enough friends & 2) the friends you have here are more valuable than the ones far, far away. Or perhaps it’s better to say that the more friends you have closer to you, the better off you are.

This is a long one, but it’s been a great week! And I just want to close this out by saying that I have to thank God for all of this. I have no education or training in business at all. I have very little experience in doing this. So, I can’t claim that any of this is my doing. I do have a bit of talent, sure, but this is beyond anything I could’ve ever imagined. If I just happened to pick a subject that people respond to & just happened to pick locations where these things can really shine in, & the owners just happened to agree to it, & I just happened to pick a business model that seems to work, like all of this is just dumb luck. For the Christian there are too many coincidences to explain away to just be random & not a blessing from God. So, as a Christian, believing this is from God, just the blessing itself, while appreciated is not enough. Knowing God as well as I do, He’s got something cooking, but what it is I cannot say right now. It’s like 1 Samuel 22:3, “Then David went from [the cave at Adullam] to Mizpah in Moab, where he said to the king of Moab, ‘Please let my father & mother stay with you until I know what God is going to do for me.’” For me, it’s less about what God will do for me & more of what He will do with me. And all I can do is follow Him, be patient & wait, but be ready to recognize & seize the opportunity when He reveals it to me.

Have a great week!