Friday, September 29th, 2006
The bonuses of small biz
I spoke with a women today who is interested in taking some classes and learning more about Photoshop and Digital Photography. Much to her surprise, we are the place where she can get hands-on experience with it all! As I explained that we are holding classes in St. Paul until the store opens, then will be moving to that location with additional services and such, she was really excited and asked to be added to my mailing list.
This is the kind of interaction that is vital to the success of Ekcetera at this point and I feel so fortunate to be able to be the person that spoke with this woman. Yes, I still am a company of one and most inquiries will come to me for a while, but it won’t be long until I have multiple employees and my interaction with the end client will be less and less. I hope that my passion for this business can be conveyed through my conversation with people and it is very important for me to be at the customer level interacting with clients. I cherish these moments now because I am the one person interacting with clients, but as the business grows, this will become harder and harder.
I proclaim, in writing, that as my business grows and I become busier and busier that I will take the time to stop and take some customer phone calls and be on the sales floor of my store interacting with customers explaining to them what we can offer and helping them with their creative pursuits.
This is one way that I can make sure that my mission in building Ekcetera remains apparent and it will also help instill a culture among the employees of the company that the only true way this concept can be successful is with the creation of a community of creative people who are interested in helping each other and sharing ideas.
This company is not your typical retail store. I don’t need people to exist strictly for the purpose of stocking shelves and my customers don’t come into the store to buy something and then leave. This is a community I’m building. It’s a place to come to get inspiration. It’s a place where the people working there are able to throw ideas out and in turn, take ideas from customers and work together to make the store better, and to make the customer’s project better.
I must come back an read this when I start to face the challanges of transitioning from a one-man business to being the CEO/President of a growing company with may facets.