Foiled...

by math. Yes, it's sad but true and those who know me well will agree. I am horrible at math. Lord only knows how I actually got into business school - aside of course from my good looks, witty humor, and the fact that there was no one else from my career path applying to school and they figured why not, it'll make for an interesting addition if nothing else.

Up until now I've been thinking that I had to support four trade shows in the next three months. I realized today that it's four in the next eight weeks. Ah - so not good at math.

Interestingly enough I was only going to be supporting three trade shows in the next eight weeks until the other day. I had planned to go to a trade show that was just outside my industry niche but from which there's been increasing interest in products like mine from retailers and consumers. It's in my home city so easy to get to and I've heard great things about it. Then I had also planned to go to a show in Vegas in September which will hopefully bring in a lot of southern california buyers who should, in theory, be interested in my products. And lastly we were headed to one of the biggest industry trade shows in Chicago in October.

Of course there are others that I've had my eye on but finances being - as always - tight - I figured that we'd see how this year goes (in truth, our first full calendar year of operation) and then reevaluate for 2008. The other day I got a call from one of my sales reps who wants to have our product in her booth at one of the biggest and most well-known luxury trade shows within our industry. The luxury market - for which we were created - is growing in leaps and bounds (hoping the economy doesn't collapse) and we had wanted to attend the show so now we've got a very cheap way to get in and see if it works. I'm a little hesitant about the fact that for the first time someone else will be representing our product but she promised me I can send her some cheat sheets to help keep the marketing message the same everywhere.

So we'll see...