This will be a bit nuts and bolts business.

The last two days have been extremely slow, after a very busy weekend. The weather has something to do with it. As I mentioned last week, weather change causes shock to the customers. Last week, the first two days were awful, too, and I was hoping that the weather would stay good. Instead, it got kind of wet, chilly, and windy toward the middle of the week. So I'll express the hope again -- that the weather has turned to nice for a good long stretch.

I also think that we got a wave of regular customers in over the weekend (for Free Comic Book Day) that normally would have trickled in throughout the week. It's something I've noticed about most promotions -- there is almost always a take-back; more on the day of the promotion, less on the days immediately proceeding or following. One of the reasons I'm not a fan of most 'event' driven appeals to the customer.

Anyway, despite the last two days, our average is still pretty good. But just like the two slow days last week pulled down our average for the whole month, so have these two days. So instead of being ahead, we are just slightly behind.

When I did my reorders this week, they only came in at about 600.00 of my 1500.00 weekly budget. I swore that I wouldn't vary this amount of spending; that if I happened to have a slow week, I'd just use the leftover budget to buy the more sporadic material, such as weird candies, stand-ups, and such. But if I wait until next week, I can put it on next month's credit card bill. So I'm just going to keep the 900.00 difference as compensation for the last two rotten days.

I'm nothing if not inconsistent.

I have my wife's store as a contrast. She doesn't have 'big' days because of shipping; the streets outside her store are never closed for 'festivals'' ; she doesn't have big promotion event driven sales. She just has good steady sales on a day to day basis. Much less highs or lows, much more predictable. If she does her job, sales stay pretty steady. I kind of long for that consistency.