Where I've Been...

My apologies to the three people who actually read this blog for not posting anything in - oh - a month now! In a nutshell, I'm here and still alive. It's just that it's tax season for the business so I've been trying to pull everything together with the help of a very competant accountant and get everything filed to the tax authorities on time. And then my bank decided to levy incredible fees if I don't keep a minimum of $5000 in the bank starting Feb 5. Yes, I'm supposed to have $5K of my own money just sitting there but not being used. Because there's just so much other cash available to small businesses these days! So I've also been finding a new bank, opening up those accounts, and now switching over my merchant account and other logistics that are tied directly into my bank account.

I do have some good news to share: Despite a heck of a year my business ended the year with a profit. A true "In the Black" profit. Sales ended up being down about 4% which isn't too shabby considering the state of economy but what really saved me was the cost cutting I did throughout the year.

And now the bad news: Despite having a pretty darn good year I'm struggling for motivation. I don't know if it's simply because I love my part-time job so much or if I still have post-holiday hangover from all the holiday orders, but I'm having trouble getting excited about another year. Don't get me wrong, I'm on board for another year but I'm not sure how long I can keep doing this year in and year out. So I'm going to take some time this year to get everything in order and write up things like an Operations Manual so that all the information about the business isn't simply wrapped up in my head. Not only is it a good idea to have all that written down anyway (and I should have done it years ago) but if (a BIG if!) I decide down the road I want to sell the business I will need those materials so I may as well start working on them now.

In the meantime I'm planning to clean up my office next week in the hopes that a clean and organized office will help me find some of that lost motivation.

It's beginning to look a lot like...

In truth, up in my neck of the woods it's beginning to look a lot like flooding of epic proportions (definitely thinking now may be time to invest in some ark building classes) but it is starting to look like Christmas.

Things have been so busy around here lately, including retail shows the past two weekends (the first one was spectacular and tons of fun, the second one not so much of either) and drop ship orders going out daily, that it's sometimes hard to get into the holiday spirit. Every year I seem to surface right around the 17th of December when things finally slow down a bit only to realize that I'm rapidly bearing down on Christmas. I don't even want to talk about how early Hanukkah was this year - that was patently unfair to everyone and definitely something that needs to be taken under advisory by the Rabbinical Counsel! It was basically "hurry up and eat your Thanksgiving turkey so we can get to Hanukkah!"

But it's slowly dawning on me that Christmas is right around the corner. This year we even got a tree up and lit which is a marked improvement over our lack of any holiday decorations last year. I have some Christmas cookies baking in the oven and this afternoon, if things go according to plan, I'll light the Christmas tree candle (our tree is fake since I hate cutting down real ones so I invested in an incredible fir tree candle from Thymes (thymes.com) to give me that holiday smell) and give thanks to the Internet for allowing me to do all my shopping without setting foot in a single store. Internet shopping is a godsend to enrepreneurs like myself who rely on fourth quarter for 75% of sales revenue!

That'll teach me...

If you haven't done so already, read the post just below this one first.

Now that you've read that - here is how I saw my day going:
1. putter around a bit
2. think about doing something productive
3. get absorbed in mindless internet surfing
4. take a nap
5. go to yoga - congratulate myself on being productive
6. debate what to have for dinner since hubby is working late - seriously contemplate just eating chocolate chips and marshmellows

Here's what really happened. Not 5 minutes - and I'm not exaggerating - literally minutes after getting that last post written I get a phone call from one of my drop ship retailers. Turns out they've been having problems with their drop ship software and I had 27 orders waiting for me. Some of which that have been sitting there since Nov. 24th! I almost laughed out loud given that I had just gloated over the fact that all orders were out the door. Silly girl!

I just spent the last several hours frantically packaging, invoicing, printing shipping slips, printing mailing labels, packing into shipping boxes, and rushing to UPS where I managed to drop off all 27 orders with 7 minutes to spare before they closed pickup for the evening.

Remind me to never ever again revel in the fact that things are quiet. The Universe is just waiting to smack me upside the head. So today - Universe 1 Entrepreneur 0

...tiptoe...

...i'm quietly tiptoeing on here to announce in a whisper (lest the internet gods hear me) that as of right now every single order for the year is done AND i'm all caught up from last week's show and have even made more product in advance of this weekend's show. What on earth am I going to do with myself for the rest of the day?

(here's a few ideas...update the last 3 months of quickbooks, clean my office, make sure all bills are paid...do some work on my book (yep - a book - more on that later)...work on the website for said book (more on that later too)...sweep the upstairs...quickbooks (again - it's that important)...)

So yes, there's things that need to get done but nothing that needs to be done today. I'm debating between working on QuickBooks and taking a nap with my dogs. Hmmm...which way to go on that decision?

Silent Night

I'm officially taking tonight off from work of any kind (well - except perhaps housework). It's been a whirwind week between lots of time at the part-time gig and then a big holiday show this past Saturday and Sunday. But man did I have fun! This was the second time I've done this holiday show and it's probably one of my favorites. Just a really fun vibe and lots and lots of customers to talk to (and a good deal of money made too!). But the turnaround from that back into another full and busy week has me feeling a tad exhausted. There's still plenty to do - especially since I have another holiday show this upcoming Saturday - but I'm taking tonight off. Now I just need to find something stupid on tv to zone out to because I simply don't have it in me to read anything of any substance and, sadly, don't have any easy reading material in the house.

Bad Business Practices 101

I *just* - as in minutes ago - got my company's new holiday products listed on my company website. Yes, I am a horrible horrible businesswoman. I know I should have gotten it done weeks ago but it just never happened. The main culprit is my computer which still refuses to allow me access to my own website. So I had to pull up my relic of a business school computer. Granted, it takes 10 minutes to boot up but it gives me access to my own site.

I may be asking Santa for a new computer this year. I've been good, right?

In other news, I received a certified letter on Monday which sent me into an absolute tizzy. Certified letters never contain anything good and my head ran through 101 scenarios - none of which were positive - before I went to go pick up the letter on Tuesday as I had been at the part-time gig when they tried to deliver on Monday and they needed my signature. Only to complicate matters a massive (well, massive by Northwest standards) snowstorm had surprised my city and we were basically all in lockdown starting Monday night. So I carefully dug my car out and made it to the post office only to find out that in the chaos of the snowstorm the day before, my certified letter had somehow been misplaced. "Oh don't worry, I'm sure we'll find it before too long," the nice post office people assured me as my heart raced convinced that I was now headed to the clinker for some unknown offense that I wasn't addressing.

Long story short, the letter finally showed up on Friday but not before I lost a tremendous amount of sleep over it and likely cut a year off my lifespan. Turns out I hadn't put my telephone number on a specific piece of administration paperwork and they need said telephone number (and apparently $50 for their troubles) to be able to file it properly.

Needless to say, I feel a tad foolish for my reaction. But on a more positive note, said paperwork is now back in the mail to them (with their $50) and I have all my holiday products listed on my website. Oh - and Thanksgiving went off without too much trouble thanks to the fact that the snow melted enough to allow my better half to make it to the smoked BBQ joint that I had ordered our turkey from. Seriously - outsourcing the turkey makes the whole day much more enjoyable!

Bad Blogger

A title I've definitely earned as of late - bad blogger! It's not that I don't think of posts - it's just that the technology doesn't currently exist to turn my thoughts into actual posts and time is something I'm having a hard time finding lately. I've been getting in a surprising number of last-minute wholesale orders (well, last minute when you figure Thanksgiving and the true beginning of the holiday season is next week) and of course all of those retailers want me to ship their orders right now!!!!! I debate telling them that if they had thought ahead and either ordered before now or, at the very least, preordered so that I could have had their order ready and waiting to ship, then they could have it right now. Instead they go to the back of the ever-growing line.

Then toss in the part-time gig, a friend in town last weekend, family coming into town next week, and two retail shows in the next two weeks and things are a bit frantic. My mother asked me what I wanted for Christmas the other day and I told her what I could really use is an extra week before Thanksgiving to try and get everything under control. Instead it looks like it's full steam ahead until Dec. 23rd when I'm shutting down the business (and possibly myself as well) until after the new year.

In the meantime, I got a call from a larger company that I dropship items for asking what I had in line for Holidays 2011. My head just about exploded when I heard that. 2011 - I'm still trying to figure out how to make it through 2010 in one piece! That's a phone call I have to return on Monday...do you have any ideas?

When did November show up?

All of the sudden it's the first weekend in November and yet the house (aka - my office) is still full of orders going out the door while I also try to tackle some other projects I need to get done before half of my family descends on my tiny house for Thanksgiving. My to-do lists are growing longer and yet no matter how much I get done in a day I don't feel like I'm making much headway because for everything I manage to cross off there's at least two more things that get added to the list.

My better half is also in the midst of his usual fourth quarter craziness (he's currently on the first of what will likely be several conference calls this weekend) and this past week I don't think we actually managed to spend any time with one another because each of us were constantly going different directions.

I'm also working on some pretty big projects at my part-time zoo job that I undertook because I saw tremendous room for improvement. Everyone's excited about the ideas, I'm super excited about them, but it's an awful lot of work. It'll be fantastic at the end of the day but for now my days are literally jampacked. A typical day starts with my company work, zoo work for part of the day, then back to my work until bedtime with little time to breath.

It won't last forever - I know that my orders will slow down at some point in the near future (though then I need to get ready for two retail shows I have the first two weekends of December) - and pretty soon we'll be able to enjoy some lazy weekends again. In the meantime though it's a busy few months here.

But you know what, in this economy I can't tell you how grateful I am that both my better half and I are as busy as we are. Not to get too spiritual on anyone here, but I truly feel that we are incredibly blessed right now so while I may be tired I am not for a moment complaining. This economy will hopefully be the toughest that we ever see in our lifetime and so far the little liferaft we've strapped together is riding out the storm pretty well.

Locked Out

For some reason I'm getting locked out of everything lately. First I was locked out of this blog for several days (which is why you haven't heard a peep in a while) and now I'm also locked out of my own company website. I have no idea why. The website works on everyone else's computer and even works on my better half's computer which is running on the same wireless internet so I literally have no idea what's going on. Anyone have any thoughts?

A Good Call

Last week was the second of the two big Fall tradeshows and for the first time in four years I didn't go. It was a bit sad as that was the first tradeshow I ever went to with the business and I distinctly remember calling my better half partway through the show saying "I think we have a legititmate business here!" There was just that much interest.

But that was the heyday of the economy and as the economy slid into the doldrums so did that show. Last year it was painful to be there and stand around for three days - from 9am - 6pm - twiddeling my thumbs. The good news is that I wasn't the only one staring down the aisles just hoping a buyer would come along simply to have someone to talk to. It was that bad for everyone!

So I made the decision not to go back. It's bad enough to kill three days with nothing to do and no orders to show for it. It's even worse when it's cost you about $4000 once you figure in booth fees, flights, hotels, etc etc. I was nervous about the decision but just didn't have it in me to go through that again this year.

Turns out I made the right decision. In talking to some folks I know in the industry who went to the show it was even slower this year then last year (something I find hard to believe). My one friend said she had a total of five sales all show. That's not a quick way to make up the $4000+ investment in the show.

I'm sad to see this show become so poor but am glad I didn't go back this year and certainly won't be jumping on the bandwagon next year to head back!

Pulling A Double

It's been quiet on this blog lately because I'm doing double-duty of both employee and business owner and right now, when things are busy with my business, that leaves me little extra time for blogging or just about much of anything.

Orders continue to go out the door almost daily so things are pretty good right now. And while I wish I knew that a big order was coming in on the scale of last year's big orders, honestly the fact that it likely won't happen has actually taken a huge weight off my shouldars. Even though this means I'll be sitting on some inventory for the next few months and working through it, I am happy that I'm leaving my workspace at the end of the month on my terms yet I have some time to figure out what I'm going to do next workspace-wise. As I think I mentioned before, my workspace had changed significantly over the last few months not the least of which is that the owners are putting it up for sale. While it won't likely sell too quickly in this economy, I feared that one day I could show up and learn that I had 30 days to find new digs. With this build-up in inventory I have time to proactively determine what my next steps will be rather than simply reacting and trying to make do with something.

So it's all good here and I'm loving what Fall can be like when my stress level is ratchted down significantly. I imagine it'll get even better come November when I'm not constantly running between job to workspace to FedEx/UPS for order shipment to home to packing orders...it'll all be good!

Lemonade Anyone?

Cause we got plenty of lemons around here this week.

Every year for the past few years I've gotten slammed in the fall between orders from my small independent retailers and a few BIG orders from BIG retailers as well. Which means that every fall for the past few years I've run around like a chicken with my head cut off. Earlier this year I decided I was done being so nuts in the Fall and worked feverishly in the first part of the year to build up my inventory so at least I'd have something to fall back on when those orders came rolling in.

Only now it doesn't look like they're going to be rolling in. My little independent guys are ordering but the BIG guys have taken a pass this year (apparently you can get stuff cheaper over in China...who knew!). So now I have all this inventory and no where to send it. As you can see...lemons.

But here's where the lemonade part of it comes in. After sulking for about two hours yesterday about the BIG guys passing on me, I realized that the amount of inventory I have actually sets me up very well for next year. I have plenty of stuff to sell and it all fits with my company's mission of being handcrafted. Which means, I realized, that I don't need to hold onto my workspace lease because I don't need a place to make stuff. This is actually great because it not only frees me up timewise to spend more energy on 'selling' but it also frees up a significant portion of cash to put towards 'selling.' So I'm really excited by the change. Starting in November (I was able to get out of my lease at the end of Oct) I will be operating like most other manufacturers in my industry as I will have 'bought in' (or in my case - made and paid for) my inventory already and will be focused on selling it.

So yes, while it was raining lemons for a little bit yesterday. I'm surprisingly excited about this new tactic and seeing where it will go.

Hangover

Remember when you were in college and perhaps woke up with a dead squirrel taste in your mouth, feeling like your body had been hit by a mac truck, and trying to figure out why you had been sleeping on the lawn? (no, mom, I never did that - I swear!) That hangover was a breeze compared to this week and sadly I don't even have alcohol to blame for it.

Last week was truly the perfect storm I had anticipated. I got all my event orders late in the day on Monday so literally spent a good chunk of Monday night, all day Tuesday, most of Wednesday night, and all of Thursday getting those 150+ orders packed up, invoiced, UPS'd, and shipped out.

You notice that I wasn't doing anything Wednesday during the day? Well that's because I was manning the desk at my zoo job for our Groupon. I had played a major role in convincing senior management we needed to do a 'Groupon' despite a fair bit of resistence. Since this was the first major project I'd taken before senior management I was terrified that a poor response would be a black mark on my reputation not to mention the fact that I simply wanted it to go well. The two nights before the Groupon - when not packing up orders - I was tossing and turning in my sleep and having nightmares.

Wednesday I was up and online by 5:40am. By the time I went to bed that night we had becoming the second best selling Groupon in our city of all time and by Thursday morning (the Groupon ended at midnight the night before) we had bumped up to the top selling spot. Needless to say, I was ecstatic as was senior management. And then I got back to packing up orders for my business.

Now that it's all over and I'm merely back to packing up tradeshow orders I find myself dropdead exhausted by 8pm and crawling into bed at 9pm every night this week. Oh wait...look at that...it's bed time!

Next Steps

I'm back from the tradeshow - not quite sure why I'm awake and functioning already given what time my flight got in last night. But I'm home and glad for it. Vegas, I find, is fun for about the first 24 hours and after that I grow weary of being inside all day where the temperature is a constant 68degrees and there are no clocks on the walls (which is actually my biggest pet peeve about Vegas). I did however find the pool (hooray!) and made it to my favorite 'off the strip' Thai restaurant which was even better then I remembered.

The show went OK. Not great - not horrible - just OK. The big event that is currently happening is also going OK. Not great and not near what I had hoped at this point. But it's OK. Not sure if it'll be good enough to get invited back for another event though.

So this is what I find myself pondering this morning. The business is going OK and in this economy I should be happy with that. But the truth is that I'm just so darn tired right now and I need to figure out what my next step is going to be. The truth is that as much lip service as people give to wanting "handmade" or "Made in America" products, at the tradeshows at least, what sells is cheap crap from China. I just can't compete with that nor do I want to. Which makes me wonder if there really is a strong market for my products or whether that market withered and died with the economy. Do I keep searching for that market or do I just shut down all together?

Right now I'm leaning towards keeping the business going but moving it into much more of a part-time or, dare I say it, even hobby catagory. I'm probably halfway there already this year given how little I spent on advertising and tradeshows this year. Or do I just decide to try and sell the thing and get whatever money I can out of it? But who would honestly want to buy a business that's just ok? And, if I'm perfectly honest with myself, selling this business feels like it would be selling off on of my appendages so maybe I'm not ready for that yet.

We'll see, I need a little more time and space from Vegas before I make a decision one way or another.

The Perfect Storm

I realize there's only been the sound of crickets chirping on this blog lately but there's good reason for that. The perfect storm is brewing. I can see it out on the horizon and I'm desperately trying to batten down the hatches before it hits. Let's see, how best to break this down:

Job #1 (my own company)
1. I leave for Las Vegas on Monday for a tradeshow so I've been manically trying to get everything ready for that, get booth materials shipped out (which I sent via FedEx because it was the cheapest option available), packing, getting the house cleaned up before the pet sitter comes in for the week, etc
2. In advance of the tradeshow I've been trying to touch base with all my BIG and Medium clients over the phone (rather than a nonpersonal email) to let them know that we'll be at the show and encourage them to stop by the booth to say hello in person.
3. In advance of what I'm hoping will be decent orders, I've been frantically trying to build up some inventory so I've been putting in super long days at my workspace and then coming home and doing more work at home.
4. Oh, and did I forget to mention the "event" that's taking place next week (while I'm away at the tradeshow)? Without giving too much away, I was approached by an online retailer - a HUGE online retailer with something like 2.8M customers - about doing an event with them next week where I essentially offer up a range of my products to them at a discount. Once I ran all the numbers I realized that I'd still be making more then my wholesale price so I agreed to do it. So much of the last two weeks has been spent getting inventory ready to go for that, getting packaging ordered in (I'll be dropshipping all orders), and getting all information and photos to the retail company in advance of this event. In theory, if things go well, I'll start drop shipping a week from Monday right after I'm back from the tradeshow. If things go really well it will completely knock me out of inventory for all my wholesale orders. I'm hoping it goes really well but the thought terrifies me at the same time.

But wait, that's just one job...now let's look at Job #2
1. The zoo has been incredibly busy the last few weeks as the summer season is winding down. I've consistently been putting in 25+hrs a week which, I realize, doesn't sound like much, but when you fit in another 20+ hours of workspace time and probably another 4-6hrs nightly of work (and about 10 each weekend day), there's been a lot going on.
2. But here's where things get really fun. A colleague and myself managed to single-handedly (double-handedly?) convince the senior management team to go out on a limb and try a new marketing tactic that could pay off huge or fail miserably. After we convinced them the entire project fell on my shouldars to coordinate. Guess when it's all going down...nope, not next week...a week from Monday (the same day all teh drop shipipng has to begin). But next week, when I'm in Las Vegas, will be all the final prep for this event. I honestly think that a large part of my reputation is riding on this event and while my boss knows I'll be away he still wanted to go forward.

So my stress level is in the red zone right now between the two jobs and anytime I've thought about sitting down to get this all down on paper (screen?) I just didn't even know where to begin. Is it too much to ask that everything just exceed expectations? That my show just go gang-busters and I get great orders and reorders, that my "event" maxes out and goes so well they invite me back to do another one before the holidays (which is where I could really make some serious serious money with them), and that the marketing piece for the zoo just blow everyone away? Do you think my chances are better at winning some huge slots in Vegas?

What I need to do now is get to Vegas, get my booth set up, and then take my new pretty Kindle and go sit by the pool for an hour and just "be." Then I need to buy myself an overpriced Vegas beverage and just prepare myself to ride out the next two weeks

Helping the Economy

My credit card is on fire this week as I'm buying in massive (well, massive for me) amounts of packaging right now. I seriously put it off as late as possible but the time has come and I'm spending like a champ right now. I shuddar to think what next month's credit card bill will look like. At least I'm getting miles...sigh...

I'm also helping the employment figures as I've hired on a part-time staff person to help out for the next few weeks and, if things go well, the next few months. This person has worked for me before and is an absolute rock star of an employee. I wish I could hire her fulltime but that's just not in the cards right now. Seriously, she's so good that I've given her keys to the workspace and she'll be in there by herself while I'm at the upcoming tradeshow. I'm still dreaming of the day I can afford to have her in there more then me. It's a goal I'm working towards. In the meantime, it's both of us working our little tails off.

The reason why things have gone to warp speed lately, and why all my cash is currently headed towards packing and employement taxes, is that I've been invited to do a sales promo with a very prestigious online company (no, not groupon!). The company takes a portion of what sells but the costs still work out in my favor. The event will take place mid-September and I'm really hoping it goes well so that I can get some much-needed cash flow out of it (to pay for all that packaging and employement taxes) but also so that I can be invited back to to a holiday promotion which is when my stuff typically really shines.

Here's the catch, the online promotion happens to coincide with the last day of my tradeshow. So, if said promotion goes really well - which is what I'm hoping for - it will basically deplete me of my entire inventory stock and I'll be headed into the busiest few months of my year without any inventory. I realize that's a wonderful position to be in if it happens, but it's a little nerve-wracking at the same time. Then top it off with the fact that yesterday I got an email from one of my BIG clients wanting to reopen discussions on their holiday order and "how soon could we get it" may mean that I end my tradeshow in the red with regards to inventory if this BIG client gets me a purchase order between now and then. Again, all good problems to have but it's got my head spinning just a bit.

In the meantime, I need to walk the dogs and get to my own part-time job this afternoon. Yes, things are a tad crazy around here right now. But at least I'm helping the economy!

An Inglorious End to my Farmers Markets

The farmers markets didn't pan out for me. Thankfully I had only signed up to attend five during the summer (five total markets - not five markets a week) as I quickly learned that while I really enjoy being at the market and talking to people, I simply hate hate hate the whole set up and tear down of the market. The lugging everything to the car and stuffing it full (I have a Subaru wagon and it still barely all fits!), then going across town to the market, pulling everything out of my car, struggling in the heat to get everything set up (no matter what anyone says, those 10x10 tents are not easy to get up by yourself). But that's only the half of it - you have to do it all in reverse at the end of the day.

Then last week I went through the entire process of getting everything out and into my car, shlepped across town, only to find out that they had made a mistake and din't have me on the schedule nor did they have space for me. Sadly, I was more relieved that I didn't have to go through the whole set up then I was angry over the mistake. I think that's when I realized how very much I didn't want to do any more markets. So I traded out with someone else I know who makes similar products and she is going to take my space at the remaining markets I'm supposed to do.

If the markets had been huge money makers for me I probably wouldn't have traded in my time, but they really didn't bring in that much - at least not enough, in my mind, to make it worth all the hassle. And with my big tradeshow of the season looming in the near future and the zoo job, I felt like I had more then enough to keep me busy this Thursday afternoon rather than sitting at the market all afternoon.

Juggling

I suspect I'm in what may be the craziest piece of juggling I'll encounter between the two jobs (watch me eat my words in a few months when things are really hectic). Right now is the last push at the zoo so it's been really really busy. Not only busy, but it's also thrown my schedule all out of wack so that with the exception of last weekend, I've basically had to work 6-7days a week for the last few weeks. Not necessarily full days, but enough hours that you have to try and juggle the rest of your schedule around it.

Add to that the fact that the tradeshow season is literally right around the corner (when did September decide to show up and why didn't anyone tell me it was so close?) so I'm trying to get everything needed to get all those pieces into place as well as sending out samples to some of my larger customers and those I want to be customers.

And lastly, my better half finds himself traveling for work basically every week which means the pups need to find someone to entertain them when he and I aren't around for long stretches. So we're fully utilizing doggie daycare (though it means someone has to juggle the drop off/pick ups of the pups), a new dog walker/sitter service, and relying on good good friends to stop by and let them out when their little legs are crossed.

Despite all of those though I'm really happy. I've probably got a little too much on my plate right now between work and house projects (but hooray - I managed NOT to paint the windows shut - that's an accomplishment!) and lord knows my workout schedule isn't what I wish it was, but I'm confident it can all be handled and with an end in sight (by labor day the zoo slows down...course then my business really picks up) I'm trying to make the most of these last days of summer.

Dog Days of Summer

It is absolutely gorgeous, beautiful warm and sunny summer weather here. Don't hate me east coasters for the fact that our summer temps are an enviable 75degrees, blue skies, and no humidity. Granted, summer just showed up a month ago so it was a little late to get here but I'm loving it nonetheless.

And it has me trying to pack a year's worth of outdoor projects into the already full days. The big one right now is doing touch-up paint to the exterior of our house. While it's good for the look of the house, the real reason is that unpainted surfaces get so wet in our rainy season (aka - winter) that it makes them prime suspects for M.O.L.D. That is a word that is enough to put the fear of God into any home owner so I've been feverishly painting.

What does this have to do about work? Well, between my painting project, my part-time job, and then my workspace time and real job, things have been busy around here lately. So on Monday when I received notice that applications were up for a retail Holiday show I knew I had to spend the evening getting the application ready or I would forget about it all together. I went to this retail show last year and did really well so I'm hoping they accept me again this year (it's a juried show which means not everyone gets in). If nothing else, how quickly I turned the application around ought to show them I'm excited about the show!

Speaking of shows, I learned yesterday that my BIG wholesale trade show that is held in September every year will be moving to July starting 2013 so as to "better accomodate holiday orders." What they really mean is that they want to put more emphasis on the larger manufacturers and larger retailers who have to place their holiday orders six months in advance so they can have the products made in China and shipped over in time for the holidays. I won't lie, I'm a bit peeved off at the whole situation because my buyers - even my larger manufacturers - just don't plan that far out. I realize I don't have to worry about this just yet given that it's three years away but I figure this is the motivation I need to wean my business off of tradeshows all together. Not sure if it can be done but since I'm down to only one this year there's really no other place to go other then to cut them altogether.

Busy epiphanies

Really I've only had one epiphany but it was a good one. More on that in a minute.

Things have been busy busy busy around here lately. My job at the zoo is going full bore and I'm loving every minute of it. A job that I so tentatively took about two months ago I now find myself madly in love with and terrified that I may be let go due to budget constraints (the zoo is a nonprofit and we all know how nonprofits fare in recessions...). I'm hoping hoping hoping that my measly salary is really only seen as a blip on the zoo's accounting spreadsheet so that if they start making cuts I won't be a casualty. So instead my team is working on ways to bring in revenue so that no one's jobs are at risk. Wish me luck - we have a few months left to pull it off...

My company is still humming along despite the lack of attention it's been getting. I actually spent a lot of time involved with that group tradeshow ad and getting that whole thing coordinated and I must admit that all the hairpulling paid off. The ad came out beautifully and is going to look great at the show. Plus it only ends up costing each party about 1/4 of what it would have cost each of us individually so it's win win for everyone. I'm really happy with the way it all worked out.

So now for the epiphany...I spent most of July going back and forth in my head about the viability of keeping my company going given that my workspace is probably no longer going to be an option come the end of the year. I do have the option of turning my backyard shed into a workspace or finding another workspace all together but before I did either I wanted to guage the level of commitment I had to the business. No need to move all the stuff from one space to another just to want to shut it all down a year later. What my month of self-reflection finally revealed is that I do love the business and want to continue with it and that a lot of anxiety I've been having over it has to do with some of the contentious relationships in my current workspace. I'm still waiting to see how the holiday season pans out for me and if I get a couple of the accounts I'm hoping for, but if so I'm more apt to try and get a portion of our shed builtout and use that as my workspace. We'll see though...I'm not committing to anything until I see how the rest of this year goes.