Charles Igwe’s Post

November 3, 2021 “What just happened... So we launched Christmas two weeks ago... A bunch of cute signs... And 100 ornaments... We called it... “The Ornament Warehouse!” Our goal was to make & sell 2000 ornaments by Christmas. So it’s October 1 at 9AM, and we send out the email and share the post. (Here’s the thing... launches never go well. Ever... ) We’ve never shared something and had it sell like crazy, so we just hoped for a good day. So, sitting in our basement, we launched it... And waited... 30 seconds... Ding... 5 seconds... Ding, Ding... 5 seconds... Ding, Ding, Ding, Ding... Ding, DingDIng, Ding, Ding Ding... Sales... one, 10, 30... The most we’ve ever sold up till then was $2000. Within 24 hours... We’d sold $18,000 worth of ornaments. That’s two months’ sales in a day!!! People loved them, and we are so happy. This takes so much pressure off our bank account. Only one problem... We had no idea these would take off... So, the only ones we made... We’re the samples 😅 It’s been wild, but we’re hitting two weeks for turnaround. But tomorrow, we’re going to pause orders... I’ve seen other businesses take on more than they can handle and disappoint customers. We owe it to our customers to get their orders done... so while people might think we’re crazy to turn around sales in the middle of this... it’s the right thing to do. It might take running the laser all night, but we’ll them done. We always get them done.” -Kyle -— To this date, no individual sales day has passed since the ornament launch in 2021 in the Moffatt basement. Kyle and Danelle view it as the moment they started viewing Sticks & Doodles as a real business and themselves as entrepreneurs.

Yesterday I was reading an article virtually about at what age you can plan to start any business. related to that only, there is one story in my mind that I want to share it you all, Let's begin with a story, When she was 13 years old, she had to leave her country and come to America because of the turmoil in the Soviet Union. As she was of Russian origin, it was very hard for her to resonate in such a new country. But somehow she got some work. She works in a grocery store and struggled there for 27 years. At 40, she plans to start her own business. But the money she was having was not enough to start big. So, she somehow started. As she had 27 years of struggle, she speaks broken English and understands it well. So, she opened a furniture store, and she had only two things in her mind- “Best quality furniture and at the lowest price available”. When people get to know about such an amazing store, they love it. Within a period of a while, her business became popular, and she received lots of customers. That makes her competitors jealous of her. Her competitors formed a union and told her dealer that- “If you provide furniture to this store, then no one from our union will buy from you. So, the dealer stopped giving furniture to her. This created an enormous problem for her as she had to bring furniture from another state. So, time by time, her store became the best furniture store in America, and she had lots of stores in multiple states of America in the next 20-30 years, and she became a multimillionaire businesswoman in America and managed the business until the age of 90 years. Because of her age, she handed over the business to her Grandsons and visited stores only once a week. But her grandsons didn’t like her interruptions and fired her. At 95, she gets fired from her own business. Now think, what would you do if that situation happened to you at 95. But, she didn’t make herself demotivated. At 95, she started a new furniture store in front of her old head office to compete with her own grandsons. She starts the new business, which reaches heights within a few months. But history repeats itself. The other competitors threatened the supplier. But now this time, her own grandsons started threatening suppliers about not to supply furniture to their grandma. As her old store was the biggest company in America, so nobody in America agreed to supply to her. Now, that creates big trouble as she has to bring furniture from outside the country. But, because of his excellent service and customer satisfaction, she beat her own old company and again became the number one furniture store in America in the next 5 years. After watching her splendid success, her grandsons apologize and hand over her old company to her. At 100 years, she merged with both companies and ran the business until the age of 104. At 104, she took her last breath. The name of that lady was Rose Blumkin and the name of her store is Nebraska Furniture Mart. #inspiration

-Small Business Thursdays- Returning to our journey through Bernie Marcus' book, "Kick Up Some Dust," the last post highlighted Bernie's change of career path from becoming a doctor by the principle of not wanting to bribe for his place in Harvard Medical school, despite meeting all the requirements to gain entry. His journey shifted to attending pharmacy school at Rutgers in NJ. He also got married and took a job at a food freezer company to be able to support the family. There was additional challenges, from being drafted and trying to negotiate staying for 2 more weeks in class to finish it out to receive the credit to a business professor that only taught theory with nothing to offer in real world applications. His major challenge and first exposure into business was being offered a 50% partnership stake with "Central Discount Drug." This was triggered by Larry Wortzel's father passing, Bernie's friend, and he needed help. "This was not a good partnership, and I knew it from the beginning. You have to trust your instincts and partner with the right people, otherwise they can undermine any chance at success." This lesson continued from the breakdown of his partnership with Larry to running a another discount store that turned sour. His breakthrough came when getting hired on to work at Two Guys in Totowa, New Jersey. "It was started by rothers Herbert and Sidney Hubschman in Harrison, New Jersey. They started by selling slightly damaged televisions before opening their first store in 1946 in an abandoned diner. They were so successful that other appliance dealers in the area began calling them 'those two bastards from Harrison.'" Bernie stepped in to help improve their cosmetics department while learning the trade of retail. "I knew I had a lot to learn, so I had to find out how to get the skills and experience that would help me keep my promise to triple sales. I was passionate about understanding every aspect of the business, and I Was not afraid to try new things. Some things worked, most didn't, but I knew I had to keep trying. Each mistake taught me something important, and within three years, I was running hard goods for the whole chain - everything but food, clothing, and toys. I was twenty-eight year sold and was doing $1 billion in business." This later on turned to negotiating with Panasonic to produce color televisions for Two Guys. RCA was unable to keep up with their demand and they needed to find another supplier. We'll dig further in this story of Bernie's serendipitous journey to Japan next week!

The impact of the Taylor + Travis effect on many local small businesses is pure alchemy. Thank you USA TODAY for covering the sweetest elements of something that happens once every few lifetimes, with Mollie Lothman and Cassidy Garr.🎂🏅🏈 #smallbusiness #mclainsmarket #bakery #growth #kansascity

Stop Winning At Losing! Want to know what makes a winning deal? Everyone makes money and the end user gets a fantastic product! That's winning. But many creative people kill great opportunities trying to "win the negotiation." They fight over simple contracting issues. They seek to "get their way" on deal points that don't really matter. And they often act unprofessionally. Don't let your ego or inexperience speak before your brain engages. Remember, no company needs your invention to survive. They may want it, but they probably don't need it. Know that, "Everyone must eat." The inventor must eat. The manufacturer must eat. The sales reps must eat. The company must eat. The company's investors must eat. And the consumer must eat too. What does this mean? It means for a deal to work everyone has to get a share of it. And it must be priced so the consumer can afford it too. Consumers have to eat too! When negotiating a deal, structure the deal so everyone's interests are aligned. This is not easy but it is also not impossible. Ensure that everyone makes money. Do this or the deal won't stick. And, please, PLEASE, PLEASE! Leave out ego drivers and back patters. Don't demand they use your pet Schnauzer, Mr. Wuggles, as the mascot. Unless there is a real business use case for Mr. Wuggles, leave the old boy home. Also, don't over-commit. Don't agree to things you can't possibly do. This will 100% come back to bite you. Be honest with what you are selling. And be reasonable. The simple truth is you'll have an easier time negotiating a deal if you focus on the deal and stop trying to win at negotiating be that is the fastest way to lose. If you have questions, please, comment or PM me. I'm happy to offer advice and love seeing other creatives succeed too. #inventing #inventor #productDesign

This week, we’re finalizing the sale of 2 of our machines to make room for a new venture. The sale has been going well, and we're just smoothing out a few details. When I sell and hand over machines to a new owner, I always remember these 4 things: 1. Find out what helps us both. To make a good deal, it’s important to know what the buyer wants. For example, selling our 2 Phoenix machines can benefit us both: • For me: Getting money to start my franchise plans • For the seller: A new stream of income in adult nightlife vending 2. Be honest. When selling a company asset, it's important to be clear. The buyer should know how well it worked for you. Giving numbers, setting clear dates, and being open to questions are really important. 3. Make it easy to take over. Having a good plan for moving the machine and giving it to the new owner isn’t just impressive. It also helps you remember important things that can take a toll on your relationship with the buyer later. 4. Document everything. Writing down every part of the deal makes the buyer feel safer. Make a big list covering everything, and make sure things like extra costs and what's included in the price are really clear. Getting a deal done doesn’t end in negotiation; it also needs a smooth transfer of ownership. 🤝

I sold my business recently, here’s what I learnt along the way… 1. When building a business you should always build it as if you’re going to sell it at some point, even if you have no intention of doing so. It forces you to create the right structure, hire into the right positions and delegate accordingly. Then, if you do decide to sell, it makes the process easier and more attractive to potential buyers. 2. Trust your gut instinct when talking to potential buyers. We had larger offers, but it just didn’t feel right. They wanted to close down our factory and move elsewhere, their prerogative, but we wanted to protect our team. Our buyers have the right mindset as us, and are focussed on long-term growth in our current facility which was important to us. 3. Goodwill counts for a lot in negotiations. It doesn’t have to always be black and white (profit and loss). The reputation of our brand we built up can be a quantifiable asset. 4. Building a community of customers is one of the most important and valuable things we did. 10,000 of our most loyal customers in 1 group. It makes it much easier to sell, get honest feedback and build a relationship with our closest fans. 5. In a low barrier-to-entry market, innovation is vital. Keep ahead of the competition and keep your customers excited. Innovation doesn’t have to mean inventing something new all the time. Now, my wife and I are taking some time out and then focussing on building an online education platform to teach other people how to start and grow their own home fragrance business. So far, we’re enjoying this immensely, and that’s the most important thing, right?

After selling hundreds of millions in Ecom, here’s the no.1 hardest lesson I’ve learned in business (hint: it’s about selling my business): I’ve been in this game for 23 years. And seen hundreds of founders come and go, some sailing off into the sunset after a retire and lying on the beach exit while others failed. And one of the BIGGEST make-or-break moments comes when it’s time to sell the business. The mistake founders make when trying to sell their business is... Waiting too damn long. I also learned this the hard way, but the longer you wait to sell the business… The lower the likelihood of you ever actually selling it. You start to get greedy, thinking the longer you wait, the more money you’ll get. It’s like playing one more hand of Blackjack. You could pull out now, but what if? I took this lesson on the chin when trying to sell my magazine. It got pushed to the side while we were focusing on Tru Earth, and by the time we were “ready” to focus on selling it, the numbers no longer made sense. Moral of the story: Set a CLEARLY DEFINED NUMBER, a point where you want to exit the business… Then, get all your ducks in a row. If you don’t know WHEN you want to sell, the “right time” will never come. And if you don’t have all the details ironed out, you could be too late by the time you do it. Trust me.

Ready for a brand new chapter? Start by selling your house for cash to help jumpstart your future! 💯👍🏡 DM us to learn more! #AtlasVentures #CTRealEstate #HomeSelling

Dear Business Owners, How are you currently showcasing your brand to the world? Allow me to share an inspiring story with you: There’s a determined entrepreneur who operates an ice cream van amidst the chilly streets of Manchester. Logically, one might assume his sales would suffer due to the weather—after all, who craves ice cream in freezing temperatures? Yet, this guy thrives, raking in profits daily. How does he do it? He recognizes that his primary customers are children, but he wouldn’t wait for special occasions to serve them. Instead, he strategically positions his van near schools within the reach of his customers, ensuring a steady stream of eager young customers every day. As the children sights his van, they compel their parents—the secondary customers and ultimate decision-makers. Thus, a seamless exchange of goods and currency takes place, leaving all parties satisfied. So, if you're considering taking your business directly to your target audience, don't hesitate. The key lies in facilitating value exchange, wherever your customers may be. Opportunity won’t fall on your laps, you have to go for it. Especially now that the stakes are higher. #business #strategy #opportunity #sales #value #profit #marketing