Yeah, it would have to be the perfect job

Resume sent, contacts contacted...and after a day of pondering the "what ifs" I realize that it really would have to be the perfect job for me to leave all this. Sure, there are days this entrepreneurship thing drives me absolutely batty - but I do love the challenge and I'm really not sure I'm ready to give it all up. But who knows, perhaps I will find out that this is indeed the perfect job. In the meantime, it's back to business as usual at the dining room table.

Things I said I'd Never Do

I just did what I said I would never do again - I created a resume.

This morning I was looking for something online and literally stumbled upon a job posting that is "exactly" up my alley based on my experience, education, and interests. What's more, it's for a large company located in my hometown that is renowned for treating their employees very well.

So I hemmed and hawed for a little bit because I honestly wasn't looking for a job but eventually pulled together a resume and submitted it to see what happens. I'm sure it's just going to go into the recruiting black hole (though I have also reached out to a few alums from my school who work for the company to see if I can get an inside track) but I've always been a huge believer in keeping all options open and you can't even have the option open if you don't try. So the resume is out there and I'm ofcourse all a-twitter of nervous energy wondering "what if" or "what if that?"

Ironically, I've taken two new orders while pulling the resume together and even if it all comes to pass I'm not sure I'd be ready to give this up yet. Obviously I would need a ton more information about the opportunity before I could move forward so for now I'm just going to go back to running my company the very best that I can.

Not the best odds

I just got done calling up 11 of the local companies (of the 42 I have to call today) and here is the current rundown:

1 store closing up their doors
1 store selling to a new owner so not interested right now
1 store I can't find the phone number to
2 stores doesn't think my stuff will work for her (fair enough)
1 store doesn't think my stuff will work but invites me to come in anyway (getting better)
3 messages left
2 tell me to come in but aren't exactly overwhelming enthusiastic about it


sheesh - this is emotionally exhuasting...

The Glengarry leads

(If you haven't ever seen Glengarry Glen Ross I'll apologize for the reference but also recommend that you go out and rent it - or add it to your NetFlix list - asap as it is truly one of the greatest movies of all time)

"I need the good leads...the Glengarry leads"

I'm actually in the midst of compiling the "Glengarry leads" via the inquiries which are coming in to me from the direct mail piece that went out last week. We're getting a few inquiries every day and even have a few orders already so I'm hoping the trend continues.

However, right now I'm in the process of finding the phone numbers for my true Glengarry leads - my local retailers with stores within an hour radius of me. Tomorrow I have to step out of my introvert shell and call these people to essentially invite myself into stopping by to show them my wares. Not being the most outgoing person this is an incredibly hard thing for me to do but I also realize that it's something that needs to be done. If not for the "personal growth experience" opportunity it presents (yeah, I'm so uncomfortable stepping this far outside my comfort zone that I'd prefer to keep my growth stunted) then for the financial health of my business. So tomorrow I'll be calling on my Glengarry leads with the words of Alec Balwin ringing loudly in my head:

A-lways
B-e
C-losing

For What It's Worth - Customer Service

Things are starting to pick up re: the direct mail and we're getting a good handful of inquiries daily over the last few days and even have an order and several saying they're going to call next week to place orders. So far I'm pretty happy with how things are going though am still pretty far from (as my husband puts it) "500 boutiques and $200 worth of sales to each one" but ya gotta start somewhere, right?

However, I had a few calls come through today that made me think about customer service. The first call came in first thing this morning from an east coast retailer who obviously didn't know we're west coast and thus three hours behind. I called her back about an hour later and she said she was shocked to have someone call her on a Saturday. And shocked in a good way.

I didn't really think anything about it until I got another call from another retailer later in the day. She was calling with a question but told me how impressed she was that we sent her an email with the information she requested within a few hours of her sending her initial email. She told me that it sometimes takes other companies a few days to week or more to get back to her. I'm a little shocked by that. Sure we all get busy but at the base of it if we don't offer good - no, superior, customer service how are we going to get and keep retailers. Actually, I hope my competition continues to take a few days to get back to retailers as that will just make my job that much easier. But it is something worth keeping in the back of my mind so that once we do manage to grow beyond just me, one part-timer, and my dining room table that every employee knows that the customer is always first. Cliche I know, but it's true!

Remembering How Not To Fail

Last night, after coming down off my sales high and slumping back into my pit of self-doubt and worry about the company, I came to a pretty significant revelation. In short, I don't know how to fail so why am I so convinced that this business will?

Let me explain. Of course there have been things in my life that I've failed at (golf being one of the first to come to mind) but in reality whenever I've really put my mind to something I've made a success of it (success of course being a relative term). Most importantly, I was an athlete growing up and competed at a pretty high level. In all of that I would have good days and bad days but I ALWAYS had the mental strength and fortitude to continue on regardless of what happened. I never once went into a competition thinking that I was going to fail regardless who I was up against. I ALWAYS went into everyday with the mindset that I was going to give it my own best. I continue to do this now in my current chosen sport and regardless of the how the day goes I stick to the rule I initiated as a young 10-year-old: "You Never Cry On Deck"

My revelation was that I obviously still have that emotional strength within me but lately with the business I feel like I'm setting myself up for mental failure before anything even happens. Yes I want success (again, being relative) but before I can achieve that success I have to remember that I refuse to know how to fail. Simply, I refuse to fail. Yes, my game plan and strategy may change from time to time but that's just smart business sense and keeping an eye on the changing marketplace.

So here it is, I refuse to fail. I KNOW that what I'm doing is so different from so many of my competitors on so many levels so I just need to HTFU (a nod to any slowtwitchers - to those who may not be, basically I need to "harden up") and get the job done!

Everyone is feeling the stress

Apparently everyone in the household is being affected by my current stress level. How do I know? I came home from my workspace yesterday to find that in the timespan which my dogs were actually left alone - which in all honesty was maybe 2 hours max given that they were hanging out with the dog walker yesterday - one of them (and I know which one!) managed to eat one of the couch cushions. I'm not talking a minor accessory pillow - I'm talking about the ginormous pillow that goes at the back of the couch. It honestly looks like a school of piranas tore into it. Crate and Barrel just kindly informed me it will cost close to $400 to have that replaced since, sadly, there is not even enough fabric left to try and salvage something with the help of an upholsterer. My dogs have NEVER eaten any household object - even as pups - so apparently it's my stress affecting them. As punishment I've told them they have to sleep on the couch sans cushion for the next 4-6 weeks it will take for a replacement to arrive and I am taking the cost out of their salary. Sadly, they don't appear too concered and after I told them trotted outside to lie in the sun.

But the direct mail has "landed" as I've had 9 requests for information thus far. 9 out of 12,000 sent - that's not the best odds I've ever seen. But it is still early in the game so I'm still hoping to one morning waking up to finding 50 emails in my inbox. We'll see...

In the meantime though I started to be proactive today and went out to one of my retailers to show her the new product. She was very excited and purchased a bunch of the new products and reordered some of the old. Very nice to see her reaction to the new pieces. Now I just have 41 other retailers in my area to visit in the next two weeks.

I have a couple of goals with this launch:
1. Make more money from this launch then I did all of last year (ok - an ambitious goal but a good one to have, no?)
2. Sell more myself then my reps have sold for me the first half of the year. This one I'm a little more confident can be done which doesn't say a whole lot for my reps given I am a horrible sales person (though it's very slowly getting easier and I'm getting slightly better at it as time goes on).

Ok, I'm going to go out and join the dogs for a nap in the lawn...