Friday, April 24, 2020

The Things You Learn...Even With The Smallest Business


Tomorrow morning, my son will once again resume operations for Taylor Academy Plants, or A Simple Life Plants (the latter is my son's name for the business, and I like it better...). He'll set up the table, put up the signs, bring out the plants...

And wait.

Hence, the nature of commerce. You provide a good and/or service, and if that good and/or service is needed and worth the price, customers will purchase the good and/or service and everyone's happy. It's a process that's been successful for millennia, one I hope can continue for years to come.

My son has run into issues while getting product moved. Last week was a classic example. The night before our second Sidewalk Plant sale, we received a note stuck in our door. Turns out the city was going to do some road work right in front of our house.

At 7:30am, the trucks rolled in. They were done with our section of the road by 10:30am-ish. The sidewalk sale was to go on from 9am to noon-ish. When uncontrollable factors impact your operation, you can either learn from it, or curse it and blame others.

I know it's a stretch to suggest the road work greatly impacted his business. I mean, people aren't exactly beating down the door each Saturday morning. But, if anyone wanted to stop by, they'd have to circumnavigate pavers, steamrollers, and dump trucks to get to us.

I don't have the most business experience, but I'm trying to teach my son about promotion, marketing, inventory, and rolling with the punches. Tomorrow morning he'll be out--most likely with Nintendo Switch in hand--waiting to serve his customer base.

Here's to another week of experience...

And, hopefully, profit.

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