Saturday, July 14, 2007

I've been mulling over some changes at the store. Some big, big changes. So far I'm in the brainstorming stage, which means any and every idea is open to consideration. It also means I can't talk about it here, because so many of the ideas are crazy, and yet, I don't want you folks to point out all the holes until I've explored every idea.

Later, yes. In fact, later I'll want your input about whether to go forward. Or, if I decide not to go forward, we can do a dissection of the decision making.

I told my neighbor, John, at Pave Jewelry, and he laughed: "Do we need an intervention?"

I've made it no secret that I blow a fuse every 8 months or so. Sometimes I can hold off a year, but then the fuse blows in a fiery explosion of sparks and fire. I know my predilections, and try my damnedest to inoculate myself in advance. But the heart will go where the heart goes, and my poor, pitiful brain can but follow.

My wife, Linda, is no help. She always supports my leaps of faith. She encourages my foolhardiness.

She said a flattering thing, and a wise thing. She said, "I don't have any doubt that you would succeed. You have to ask yourself if it is truly what you want to do."

So that's the question. Do I settle for what I'm doing, which is finally becoming profitable and perhaps even moderately successful? Hey, can't I let myself be secure for even a little while?

Or do I take a wild leap into the blue?

How about playing it conservative and making money and relaxing? Would that be such a terrible thing? I'm going to be 55 years old in a couple more months. My career is in it's final stages. Do I really want to throw it into turmoil again?

Of course, there is no real security in small business. Doing nothing can also be dangerous. And I'm not going to be able to avoid big changes, it's just a matter of timing. I can put it off a couple of years, but big decisions are coming anyway.

I think doing nothing would make me old before my time. I have a desire to create a great store -- which isn't necessarily the same as a desire to create a store that makes great profits. In fact, they may be two different things. Creativity has always been a motivation to me.

Would I be better off being proactive? Getting ahead of the curve?

If I stick to what I'm doing, I'll be moderately successful over the short run, barring disaster. If I jump into a new situation, I put it all at risk. And for what? The excitement? The creative energy? Keeping the Best Minimum Wage Job part, instead of changing it to; A Pretty Good Job that I make better than Minimum Wage?

What often happens is that the fever passes, I come to my senses, I breathe a big sigh of relief. I'm in a very good position of feeling as though I have the option of doing something, but if every condition for success isn't met, I can back down. I've learned not to make any decisions I can't reverse.

I try hard to think outside the box. It's nearly impossible. It means being aware that there is a box, and straining to see it's outlines. It means swooping in at the ideas from odd angles, and questioning every received wisdom. What would happen if? Why not do both? What about doing neither, but is there a third option? When have I done something like this in the past, and what did I learn from it? Step outside the emotion and look at is dispassionately. Throw out the objectivity, and let emotions rule. Let your mind drift, then pounce on the idea. Sleep on it. Drink on it. Play a game of solitaire and give your brain a rest. Think on it some more. What is that weird idea? Is it really so weird?
And so on.

I like to think I love routine. That I don't like danger. That I'm not a thrill-seeking kind of guy. I like peace and quiet. A good book, a glass of wine. A nice movie, a walk in the woods.

But when it comes to business, I turn into a frikken daredevil.

Thanks for listening to my therapy session. The result is....I must be crazy. Yep, I'm definitely crazy. I'm going to go nap on it.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

The stuff times are ah-comin, and I doubt that the nice things like high-end clothes, jewelry, art, time-shares,... Will be selling very well as they're NOT essential. We already know that Bend is down this year, and the next two years are going to see less HELOC/RE spending, and high gas prices. ...

I'm also a long time business man. What I do know is that in good times you can just let the money roll in, but in bad times you must work your ass off. That is #1 for your nap ( I know I'm not telling you anything you don't know, as a fellow business man. )

#2 is cut your costs in bad time, obviously these would be the non-essentials.

You have stated your wife is doing very good, I haven't be to her store but my wife has and thinks it s very nice. Perhaps you should be out there? That said perhaps you need to find an angle for the tourists, many like books, and quite often you don't have to stock, just sell them promises like the time-share folks do. Have vast book collections of high end items that you can have shipped....

To me you have two choices, ...

1. You stay where your at and start marketing yourself like Art, Jewelry, ... HIGH-END but with the book angle.

2.) You move out next to your wife and do what you do best.

3.) Perhaps BOTH, but then that requires an employee, and at your age, you probably know that is the last thing you need in a recession, is mouths to feed that need baby-sitting.

My two cents, that said have you ever tried to market "high end" book stuff, NOTE I'm NOT suggesting inventory, just sell high-end stuff where you get the commission, tell them the reason you don't stock is that way it will be at their home when they get home from vacation.

You have been downtown you have a bookshop, you have walk-in's, you must know what they want. The only problem of course is you MUST have a strict no-return policy so you NEVER get stuck with the high-end crap.

My model is that in two years downtown will go to shit. Which means early 80's all over again, hardware stores, bars, and sleaze. Given the drop in RE-HELOC to finance the beautiful Bend, I think the old days are returning. Thus using my model in 2-3 years you may be able to swing a real nice lease.

The odd's of there NOT being a massive down-turn are very low. Easy Money will not be back for a decade. We're now in the first year of three year recession.

Let's say things do recover in three years and you pulled out of downtown, what I'm getting to is you may never again afford to come back after the recovery.

Without having the inventory it would be real nice to see you able to sell high-end stuff to the tourists, find an angle, market your self as something they think they need.

The fact is you already have the option of selling stuff at your wife's store, thus you can test all models right now.

Like the great bank robber said "I rob banks because thats where the money is", certainly this town rob's tourists because that is where the money is.

YOU NEED TO THINK OF A WAY YOU CAN ROB TOURISTS.

Anonymous said...

Duncan,

Long ago I called you Ned Flanders, because like the Simpson's character to me you remind of that all to nice Christian character next door.

I say if you have a shop downtown, then as the Romans would say, "When do Rome, do as the Romans".

Its quite silly to be in "The Shire", "Bend as Aspen", and not to be selling high-end crap to tourists.

Given that the entire downtown is ONLY about separating money from tourists then that is what you should be doing.

Otherwise why be there?

I know your a nice guy, .... blah-blah, but nice guys finish last in a tourist town like Bend.

For instance you call the people in the street out of towner's selling elephant-ears, but I guarantee you that they're of town, they work the summer in the street, and spend winter in down in Mexico.

It's the same way in Friday Harbor, WS, e.g. San-Juans. It's all about tourism, just like Bend. What MOST people do is sell Fish&Chips on the street from May-Sep, and then spend Oct-Apr at their Mexican Hacienda.

If YOUR not playing this game, then what the hell are you doing in a tourist-town???

Let's MAKE perfectly clear that Bend is just a nasty little tourist town just like Friday Harbor. Real Estate and Cotton Candy. Just like Sisters.

Perhaps you need to focus more on internet sales? Websites, ... You obviously like to spend several hours/day on the computer, perhaps you need to create the greatest card-shop in the world on the internet??

Duncan McGeary said...

The store downtown is actually working very well right now. But it's only 1000 sq. ft. and it will always be 1000 ft. and there is no more space to be had.

I don't have the dire view you have of downtown. I think there'll be a lot of comings and goings, but I don't see it emptying out.

High end books and collections. Just not interested. Can't sell what I'm not interested in.

I'm just exploring all kinds of options right now.

Duncan McGeary said...

nah, man. I make people be interested in what I'm interested in. Every time I've tried to sell something 'because it will sell' it's been a disaster.

It's easier for me to take stuff I really, really like and convince someone to buy it.

Anonymous said...

I don't have the dire view you have of downtown. I think there'll be a lot of comings and goings, but I don't see it emptying out.

*

I think you MISS my point, its NOT going to empty, its going to go back like it was in the early 80's.

It's going to be sleazy bars, and Hardware stores, and little antique shops, ran by little old lady's, an bead shops by bored housewives.

I never said that downtown would empty.

Eventually as the recession plays out the art, high-end clothes, jewelry will go away, note all this stuff can be bought on the internet. As you yourself has mentioned most this stuff is WAY overpriced downtown.

Even in the 80's downtown was NOT empty, it was just a typical quite little town with lots of used bookstores and little shops. There were lots of sleazy little bars.

Anonymous said...

I make people be interested in what I'm interested in.

*

You and me have a complete different philosophy.


"Mine is find out what they need, and give it to them."


What your saying is make them think they need what you need.

More power to you, I'm all for diversity.

Duncan McGeary said...

"Find out what they need, and give it to them."

How old-fashioned of you. I'm sure that worked before the advent of the mega-stores and the internet.

Nowadays, those guys have already figured that out.

No, I offer them what they don't even know they need, or want. Perforce, it has to be something that Wal-mart and Amazon doesn't do well.

It's the long-tail. I carry 100 items that each only have one customer, so if I have 100 customers I do O.K. The thing that all 100 customers want, they can get very very cheaply somewhere else.

This is what I mean by service -- I'm carrying something hand-picked, something I personally have some connection to, something I'm selling to you by hand.

Works for me.

No, my problem is no space. Everything else is cool.

Duncan McGeary said...

By the way, I've never said merchandise downtown is 'overpriced'. I've said it was 'high-end,' high priced if you will.

I also think that things take a lot longer to play out than you think. Sports cards have been going downhill since 1992, but American Sports only closed shop on June 1. Games had their peak on Pokemon Christmas of 2000, but Gambit only closed on January 1.

If there is the mega-holocaust you seem to be thinking, neither you and I would have the time to be talking here. We be out digging up roots, or something.

It's going to be painful, I agree, but there isn't going to be wholesale slaughter.

IHTBYB mentioned that if there is a 50% drop in housing sales and employment, that it will destroy 80% of the stores that feed off that.

I think people are alot more stubborn and reselient than that. They'll lose their shirt over a number of years, but it won't all be visible. A facade will be maintained.

More bars and antique stores -- maybe toward the end of the cycle, but I think it's more likely we'll have a series of 'high-end' stores coming and going, even at the depths.

Anonymous said...

I didn't say there would be a wholesale slaughter.

I have always said it its going to be down for the next 2-3 years.

It will be a very slow process.

Yes, towards the end of the cycle be pawn-shops, bead-shops, grandma-antique shops, little people will fill the buildings.

I'm only interested in the end result of the cycle, not so much interested in the interim.

I think in the past you have mentioned about people selling expensive stuff downtown. Tourists wouldn't have it any other way.

It's just one more reason that locals wouldn't even bother with a downtown store unless there is an explicit mid week 80% off sale.

**

So did you make the big decision?

**

I don't know about old-school in terms of marketing - sales. Humans haven't changed, a few years ago during dot-CON the kids were saying the brick&mortar were going away, ... The fact is marketing is creating a need, and sales is fulfilling that need, and anyone can be hustled, like the father of marketing said "Sex Sells".

Anonymous said...

Of course, there is no real security in small business

*

Is there security in a highly leveraged big business?

Quite often 'growth' is what everyone does, but in my years what causes failure is too much debt and expense.

Small is always more profitable.

If it were easy to succeed and/or be rich, everyone would be rich, and they are not.

Too often I see a good little restaurant 10X in size, and then go down the tubes in a year... Why? Too much debt, the new place seems empty, too many employees. Employees will always kill you.


At fifty-five you should be thinking about coasting, not exposing yourself to risk

There is never any real security in anything. Today a 'job' is longer secure, neither is a private pension fund. Certainly with the present CDO meltdown all pension funds are going to get hit -10%, and this is just the beginning.

No security, and most people live lives of quiet desperation. This is the way of mankind.

With regards to "You selling people what your interested in", and that Walmart already has everything. I disagree ALL walmart has is chinese made crap, that is like saying that Harbor-Freight has all tools

There will always be a business market for quality, and service. MOST big box stores offer neither quality nor service.

Go to most big box stores today you get surly moronic uninformed employees and shoddy chinese made product. In a town where there really are a lot of people with money, there will always be a market to sell them quality & service.

I personally NEVER worry about competition, only about the customer in front of me.

I really liked the day when there were nice little hardware stores in downtown Bend and lots of useful things that one actually wanted.

Even today in Portland, most of the old neighborhood HW stores still exist, and so do the little stores. Yet in BEND, everyone now has to drive out to Home-Depot or Lowes, its like BEND is only like california. I think its because being MOSTLY cali's, they're all big-box COSTCO shopper's.

Bend downtown is for tourists, but with the recession there will be less and less coming. The landlords of downtown will shift back into little ma&pa businesses the folks that moved here from cali will hopefully move on when its not fun anymore.