Download audio file (KingForADayVerizon.mp3)

photo credit: Sister72

I‘d like to introduce a new series called “King for a Day“. For the acronym-challenged, you might see me refer to it as KFAD now and then, so don’t assume I’m talking about a local radio station.

King for a Day is a series that will discuss some steps I’d take or issues I’d address if I was to become what else… “King (of a particular business) for a Day”.

The idea is to use big companies that many are familiar with and allow you to extrapolate from there to your business – whether its a good or bad thing they’re doing.

You should expect the discussion to center around the consumer for what I hope are obvious reasons.

If you’d like to nominate a business, add a comment and I’ll add your suggestion to the list.

I’ll be publishing KFAD on the first Friday of the month, so stay tuned for future episodes. Because these posts might get a little long, I will also podcast them. You might find a little bonus content in the podcast, so subscribe via iTunes, Google Reader or whatever you use to listen online.

One last thing to repeat before we start this exercise. This is not really about the companies that we discuss. All of this is just another way to get a point across that it’s about you, your company and most importantly, your clientele.

When reading the stories in KFAD, you should expect to:

• Search for parallels in your business
• Identify takeaways.
• Implement change for the good of your clientele – which will bring good things to you.

So let’s get started …

Focusing on the wrong thing

While it would be easy to start this out by being the King of the Airlines, I’ll mellow on that just long enough to give Verizon the treatment. The reality is that most of my comments would fit any cellular carrier, but Verizon is the one I’ve used for the last 5-7 years and thus am most familiar with.

Negative consequences

When I find a business in trouble, or simply annoying the heck out of me, it almost always seems to come down to them focusing on the wrong things.

For example, Verizon recently announced they would double their termination fee. How does this help their customers? Is it about punishing the customer? That simply won’t work.

Focusing on negative consequences completely ignores the customers who stay – and aren’t they the really important ones?

In fact, it marginalizes these customers because you’re clearly focusing on things they aren’t even doing. You’re focused on things you don’t want to happen instead of the things you *do* want to happen.

So not only do you tick them off, but your business is focused on the wrong, wrong, wrong thing – which doesn’t serve your customers.

Engage me in a Cinnabon-inspired lovefest

If I’ve made up my mind to leave you for an iPhone, a $300 termination fee isn’t going to stop me. In fact, it’s likely to tick me off and incentivize me to ramp up the goodness that I plan to milk from my new strategic communications device (no, it’s not just a phone).

Think about it: If *I’m* willing to put up with AT&T, I must have a *really* good reason to do so.

Instead of threatening me with doubled cancellation fees, you should be giving me a reason to stay. Give me lots of compelling ones, in fact. Give me things that make me want to write long, lilting caramel-covered blog posts about you that are as sickeningly sweet as a slightly under-cooked airport Cinnabon with extra frosting.  Hint: A good start would be to make it possible for me to buy a Verizon-compatible iPhone.

Focus on making changes that make your service so valuable that I *cannot* leave you. Don’t focus on things that cause you to waste management and technology resources – such as new ways to punish people who are likely leaving you anyway.

A man’s got to know his limitations

I have a 400 minute call plan. Rarely do I go over, but over the last 2 months, I’ve gone way over. I didn’t find out that little tidbit until the $400 bill arrived.

Any cell company that was interested in keeping their clients happy would tell me before that happened.

Any cell company that really cares would do what is reasonable (or do MORE than is reasonable) to see that their customers don’t make mistakes using their product. Common sense says that providing good customer care includes telling your clients when they are approaching an overage. Even banks do that.

Need a revenue source focus for this conversation? It’s a great opportunity to ask someone to upgrade their plan, even if only temporarily. Imagine that, getting paid for taking proper care of your customers.

Perhaps you might have a 3 day/week/month “Bump” plan that gives you an extra 100 minutes a week for when you’re out of town unexpectedly. Perhaps you could turn it on by dialing “*bump” and then go about your business.

When you do this, Verizon would automatically add the charge and 100 minutes per week (month, whatever) to your plan. Likewise, it would automatically terminate it after the 3 weeks/month/days or whatever.

No doubt, someone might say “we don’t have the ability to upgrade your plan, or sell temporary “bumps”, because our systems don’t allow for that”. I say – that’s an easily solvable problem in your billing system.

Same idea for text and data plans that near overage points.  (apologies to Clint for the heading)

Data plans (required)

Recently I took my 17 year old to the Verizon store to get him a new phone. His last one met with an unfortunate end of life scenario and this time, he was buying the phone himself.

Unfortunately, out of 20-30-40 phones (however many they had), only TWO could be activated without a data plan.

Now tell me, what 17 year old really *needs* a data plan? Can you justify $30 0r $60 a month additional for that? The salesperson’s line is that they aren’t allowed to sell the phone without a data plan.

For an iPhone, I get that. For a smart phone that is designed to be totally integrated with email such as a Blackberry, I get that. For a regular old cell phone, whether it has lame web capabilities or not, the customer should have the ability to get service without requiring an additional $400-$700 a year data plan – particularly for a teenager.

The iPhone (the official line vs reality)

Every time I go into the local corporate Verizon store, I ask when they are getting the iPhone.

I do it mostly to see what kind of response I get. Clearly they’ve been indoctrinated by corporate, because I get the same response every time. It’s something along the lines of “We don’t want the iPhone. It’s putting AT&T out of business and making their network too busy. Have you seen AT&T’s stock lately?”

Yeah, whatever. Have you seen AT&T’s churn rate lately? It isn’t because they offer the best service and customer care in the business.

Advice to whoever is training these folks: Get over yourself. You *want* your network to be hammered. Sure, you want it responsive, but you want more, more, more demand. You want the problem AT&T has, ie: “How much capacity can I build this year?” The more demand, the less likely you’ll ever lose them.

The source of the “Why would we want the iPhone?” attitude might be Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg himself. In 2008, Seidenberg’s childish response to iPhone question included calling the iPhone’s success a “conspiracy”.

Late in October 2009, it seems that 2 billion app store downloads and a 1% AT&T churn rate might have tempered Seidenberg’s attitude a little, as he responded to questions about Verizon selling the iPhone by noting that they were certainly interested and that it was “exclusively up to Apple“.

Disabled GPS chips

With the exception of the Storm and the (new) Droid, Verizon disables API (programming) access to the GPS chips in phones – *except* for their extra services/products. For example, you can’t use certain Google’s Mobile Maps features because Google can’t get to the GPS chip to say “Hey, where am I?”  How is that customer friendly?

It isn’t. You should be.

You get the idea by now I hope: It isn’t about you, your products or your services. It’s about all the things those products and services can do to benefit your customers.

Update: Karmically enough, the same day I post this, Apple Insider reports that a Verizon iPhone is on the way. That would keep me on Verizon.

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photo credit: Robb North

Over the last month or so, I’ve been playing phone tag with someone at the local bank’s office.

I use this national bank primarily because they offer some electronic banking services that local banks don’t bother to offer (such as a real-time, seamless interface with QuickBooks), despite my repeated “encouragement” to do so.

Some have noted that the cost to provide this QuickBooks interface is substantial – yet I get interesting wrinkled brow looks when I remind them that I pay $15 a month to use this nifty QB service because it saves us hours per month. Until the fee got to the point where the time was more valuable, I’d pay it. But I digress…

Anyhow, we’ve been talking with someone there about a refi and a combination of my schedule / travel and her schedule /travel have made it difficult to get into the same room at the same time. Not their fault, just one of those things about a busy summer.

This last time I called, the person I’m working with was out of town for several days. I asked the person on the phone if they could put me on their appointment calendar for the week after they return.

My calendar! Mine, mine, mine!

Astoundingly, the answer was no.

Yes, the folks at this large national bank, the same ones who are advanced enough to have their accounts seamlessly talk to my QuickBooks, do not allow or cannot manage to let their employees see their appointment book or schedule an appointment for someone else.

Insane.

I have a feeling it might be related to worries that someone might raid someone else’s appointment calendar for plum prospects, but there are ways of showing only open dates. Even so, that shouldn’t be necessary.

If you can’t trust a *bank* employee to access a co-worker’s appointment calendar, tell me why you trust them to work at the bank in the first place – cuz I don’t see it. But that trust thing is a topic for another day.

Unseen Value

Now we get to the point where you see where this affects you and your business: Are there resources (like an appointment calendar) that your staff should be able to share so they can help each other serve your clientele?

Back in the photography software days, it was a huge deal for new users of our product to finally get off that paper calendar at the front desk. It allowed anyone to see which photographers / camera rooms / salespeople / presentation spaces were booked and make an appointment no matter where an employee was when they answered the phone.

Sounds completely obvious, but many businesses simply couldn’t do it because they were still tied to that boat anchor – the paper appointment book.

Big, heavy and “somewhere in the warehouse”

Another market I worked with manufactured expensive custom items that were big and heavy. They stored them in the warehouse once they were finished.

The information about the build status and storage location of these custom-ordered items was kept on a set of clipboards on a line of nails in the manufacturing area.

Sometimes the info on those clipboards was out of date or missing because someone forgot to write the build status or location down. An order might get lost / forgotten until a customer called for it – and then you might find out that it hadn’t been built yet.

Now imagine that you are a receptionist in the front office and you’re all alone over lunch hour or during a big sales meeting. When that big customer calls to ask about their 27 piece, $57000 order, you have to put them on hold (or tell them you’ll call back), run back to the clipboards, flip through the orders manually, find the order and run back to the phone.

If the clipboard is missing because someone has it at a manufacturing station, or it is on the manager’s desk (or car seat), you know nothing.

If the data on the clipboard wasn’t filled out, you get to run back to the warehouse and look on dozens of shelves from floor to ceiling for an item that has a little paper tag on it showing the customer name.

That’s a boat anchor.

The alternative? A system that integrates customer information, orders, build status and delivery information together. When the phone rings, you can look up all of a customer’s orders, find the status of any of them and tell them right then. The items are barcoded as part of the manufacturing process so most status and location info is automatically updated. Depending on your situation, “most” could be “all”.

What’s your boat anchor? What can you share to get rid of it, enabling your staff to be more helpful and more productive?

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Download audio file (ShippingIsPersonal.mp3)

photo credit: freeparking

As some of you know, my wife is a junior high school teacher.

6th grade to be specific.

Know what that means? Hormones. Drama. Lots of change. Who knows what else.

People think it’s amazing that I’m a Scoutmaster for a Scout troop, but that’s easy compared to being a teacher.

Instead of having to be on my game 5 days a week with 25 6th graders, I spend 90 minutes a week with boys who want to be in Scouts. Once a month, we go camping for a weekend (and I don’t try to teach them math and history).

Back on topic – Having a teacher in the family also means something else: We watch every teacher movie ever made.

Last night, The Ron Clark Story was on. It’s a true story about a teacher who takes on an inner-city elementary class in Harlem and turns it into a high-performance environment (you knew that, since they don’t make movies about crappy teachers).

Just before the big standardized tests are taken, the kids are trying to explain why they didn’t do well on a test they took while Mr. Clark was out sick with pneumonia.

“It’s nothing personal”

One of the students says “Hey man, it’s nothing personal about you, we just cant pass these tests.”

Clark comes back and tells them “Everything that happens in this room is personal. Everything we say to one another is personal.” (and he goes on from there)

It works the same way in your business.

Everything you do for (or to) your clients.

Everything you say to (or about) your clients.

Shipping is personal

Yesterday, I had a conversation with some folks about shipping.

Like Coke vs. Pepsi and Ford vs. Chevy, this one was one of rivalries.

This time is was about Fedex vs. UPS.

During the conversation, I reflected about the service my company received from a Fedex driver who has been the only driver in Columbia Falls for 10 years.

We used them because their shipping quality was a reflection upon us. We didn’t want the very first thing we shipped to be reflection of our service.

Fedex vs. the post office or other services is always a no brainer, in my experience.

Tim our CFalls Fedex dude picked up almost every one of those packages. He still picks them up for the folks who own the business now.

These days when I have a package or I see him in a store around the Valley, he calls me by name.

If you think about it, it’s not that big a deal. After all, during a delivery, my name is on the package.

Kinda obvious, don’t you think?

Yet not one UPS driver has ever called me by name.

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photo credit: llamnudds

And would they care?

If a long time customer (2 years, 5 years, 25 years, whatever) walked into your business today and all your staff was different from their last visit, would they notice the change?

Why do I ask?

Engagement. Relationship. Stickiness.

IE: Buzzwords that answer the question: “Why the heck should I come back?”

Think about it.

• Have your employees engaged your customers in conversation, or just sold ‘em something?
• Have they worked to create a relationship that causes their customers to gravitate to them or ask for them by name when they call?
• Do your customers go to their assigned sales rep because that’s who they’re assigned to, or because they know they’ll get the help they need from someone who knows their situation better than anyone?
• Have they established a substantial level of trust with that customer to encourage repeat visits?
• Have they exerted the effort necessary to learn as much as they can about the customer in order to serve them better?
• Does your staff take ownership of their clients and their situation?
• Do your clients ask for a particular waiter when they come to your restaurant?

Is 2% the only difference between you and them?

If your staff hasn’t taken the steps I described above, wouldn’t it be a lot easier to go elsewhere to save 2%?

How are you insulating yourself from that?

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Download audio file (pollyannaprinciples.mp3)

It’s not unusual for small business owners to be involved in community organizations, so in that spirit I have something a little different from our every day discussion here – yet still completely applicable to your business – no matter what that business does.

Rather than Friday’s normal Hotseat Radio show (moving to 1230p Eastern Wednesday starting March 25th 2009), today I had the pleasure of interviewing Hildy Gottlieb, long time friend and author of the newly released book “The Pollyanna Principles“.

Hildy is a nationally-recognized consultant and President of the Community-Driven Institute in Tucson AZ, and has been called “the most innovative and practical thinker in our sector”.

That sector is what folks in Hildy’s business call “non-profit organizations” – which unfortunately describes exactly what those organizations are NOT.

One of Hildy’s missions is to change the mindset inside these organizations is to encourage them to call themselves “Community Benefit Organizations”, which describes what they are and do. The result of that subconsciously takes the “Droopy dog” attitude out of the picture.

You may feel that this is outside of the normal bounds of BIP, but in fact, it strikes at the core of it: business fundamentals, attitude and a number of the other things we talk about here on a regular basis.

You need to run it like a business

No doubt you’ve heard people say “non-profits need to run like a business” – and in fact we examine the pros and cons of that assertion, why it’s true, false and doesn’t necessarily mean what you might think.

After listening to my conversation with Hildy, I’m hoping you’ll grab a copy or 3 of her new book and provide them to the orgs that you support and believe in.

No matter what you do to encourage (convince, coerce, etc – you make the call) your favorite board member to read The Pollyanna Principles, the ultimate goal must be to make it happen. Hildy has created a great piece that organizations can use for motivation, strategy and like it or not, to arrive at the real long-term, more than a calendar quarter away, community-changing vision and a roadmap to get there.

Profit is evil? Horse Hockey.

The temptation by some in these organizations might be to ignore the great business books and their strategies, simply because they are supposedly all in the name of profit and thus not applicable to the charitable organization.

The fact of the matter is that neither assertion is true.

Still, if you prefer to stick to strategic books about the charitable sector rather than crossing over that supposedly evil profit line, then The Pollyanna Principles will be right up your alley because it was written just for you – because it’s all business. Your business.

Buy The Pollyanna Principles here

Please accept my apologies for the audio quality. We had some volume dropouts, an odd hum here and there, as well as some cool coffee shop environmental noise as I spoke with Hildy from a coffee shop in Missoula (Break Espresso, if you’re taking notes). Hildy and I have what appears to be several sessions left before we are “done” discussing her book, so I will make sure we have better infrastructure in place for those sessions.

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Download audio file (HowDoYouMakeThePhoneRing.mp3)

photo credit: Yogi

There are no secrets around here.

I am busy as crap. Some weeks, so busy that I’ve had to let the blog slide a bit (Horrors!)

I’ve made it quite clear that I expect “well-behaved” readers to be contacting their clients, customers and prospects at least once a month – and not simply to say “Whaddaya wanna buy?”

I’ve also shown that I do this in a number of different ways, using a number of different media.

Why different media?

Different strokes for different folks

Because some people like email, some like using Google Reader, some prefer audio podcasts, some prefer video (still working on that one), and still others prefer direct mail. And so on.

Likewise, some of media is about access and exposure.

Not everyone has (or wants) access to radio or RSS or email or whatever. Are you willing to give up an awesome new client because they aren’t into Twitter or RSS feeds or email?

I’m not.

Just the other day, someone emailed me to ask me about doing some work for them on a big project they’re working on.

They don’t read my blog. They don’t get my print newsletter. They don’t listen to my radio show (or podcast) on iTunes. They didn’t find me on Utterli.

They found me through my newspaper column.

Their comment was this: “Though we are strangers, I feel I’ve gotten to know you fairly well through your weekly articles”.

I’ve never met them, never talked to them, yet they feel they know me.

How much of advantage do you think I have over competitors that they don’t know?

Ideally, my competition just sits around getting splinters from the bench. They never get a chance to take a swing at this work if I have anything to say about it.

The Temptation

The temptation with communication like this is to depend solely on email because its cheap.

That’s a big mistake.

Why? Because cheap only reflects your cost. It doesn’t reflect the results. Cheap ignores the return on investment (ROI).

If you want cheap and you don’t care about results, you can get yourself 50 million email addresses for $30, but you probably won’t make a sale to more than 50 of them (depending on what you sell). Worse yet, by emailing them – you’ll end up on every email blacklist there is.

If the result is your focus, then you should be thinking “I only want to use the media that have a great ROI”. In that case, I might suggest some slight adjustments (ie: don’t use just 1 media regardless of the ROI), but otherwise you’d get no argument.

The lesson

A long-time client of mine recently switched from printed newsletters to email (still using my service, just a change in media). I suggested *adding* email, not using it as a replacement.

One of the first response emails he received from a client and good friend was “I don’t have time to read another email every week”.

That same person has demonstrated (through their actions/responses) that they do have the time to read a 4 page printed newsletter once a month, yet an almost immediate reply email said they just don’t want more email.

I made note of that irony to the client, pointing out that his client’s reaction to yet another email is a great illustration of why printed newsletters just plain work.

His reply: “No kidding.”

What makes your phone ring?

Where do your customers/clients/prospects get their information? What do they use to consume the news? That’s how you should be providing info to them.

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photo credit: scubadive67

Almost every day, I stumble upon someone looking for a way to differentiate their business from their competitors’.

Far too often, they try to compete almost solely on price.

Since I’ve beat the dont-compete-solely-on-price drum in the past (eg: all those WalMart posts), so today we’re going to take a different tack.

Is it the steak or the sizzle? Or maybe something else?

Ever been to Sizzler, Western Sizzlin’ or Ryan’s Steak House?

Likewise, have you been to Morton’s, Ruth’s Chris Steak House, Charley’s, Shula’s or Chicago Chop House?

Which would you prefer if you had a coupon for a free meal, or if someone else was buying?

My money is on Charley’s (followed very closely by Ruth’s) – though I have to admit I haven’t made it to Shula’s as yet.

Why? Because everything about the place is simply amazing. The steak, the experience, the service, and so on.

One of the best moments I’ve had with my dad was after a photography trade show (yeah, back in the software company days), where we found ourselves sitting at the bar in Charley’s near the Tampa airport.

If you eat at the bar (almost no one seems to), you get to watch the chefs fire the steak – away from the quiet luxury of the dining room – and you still get incredible service, quite possibly more attentive than the service in the dining room if that’s possible.

What about retail?

Over the last several months, I’ve spent a lot of time talking about the CPSIA situation.

Despite widespread knowledge of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act by some store owners, I see very few of them using it as a competitive advantage.

Maybe they’ve been too busy spending time trying to get their Congressional reps/Senators to change the bill. OK, maybe that’s a reason, but it isn’t an excuse. You know the difference, right?

Here’s an example: If you have a newborn and you walk into an upscale handmade baby clothing store and see a sign that says “All of our fashions for babies are tested and certified safe according to the CPSIA”, isn’t it obvious that it plants a seed in the mind of the persnickety shopper?

IE: “Shouldn’t everyone’s stuff be tested and certified safe?” Hmmm. Remember, in a store like that – the persnickety shopper is absolutely the one you *want* in your store.

If you wanted to get really aggressive about it, add “…Do the other stores you frequent care as much about your baby’s safety as we do? Ask them about the CPSIA and their testing and safety certification of the fashions they offer for your child.”

Fresh from the oven

If you have a choice, do you want warm, soft chocolate chip cookies made from scratch that are fresh out of Grandma’s oven, or do you want generic store-brand “chocolate” chip cookies that you know might have been baked a month ago?

I’d bet that you’d prefer the warm cookies from Grandma’s oven.

What about your business, product and service can create a chasm that wide, making it *that* easy to make a decision between your product/service and theirs?

Make a point of focusing on it. Educate your clientele to call attention to it so that they expect exactly what you do/sell if they find themselves elsewhere. You want to be the standard that everyone else has to meet.

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Download audio file (CompetingWithBullwinkle.mp3)

photo credit: FlyNutAA

The other day, one of our dogs chased a huge moose out of the yard.

Who cares, right? Maybe. Read on.

If you haven’t ever seen a moose, they aren’t quite as friendly as Bullwinkle. In fact, they have a reputation for being pretty mean once provoked.

Readers of the Gary Paulsen’s Hatchet series will remember a scene where the moose attacks Brian in a high mountain lake, almost drowning him.

If you remember past posts, you might assume that Blondie, our 85lb+ Golden Retriever/Alaskan Husky mix might be the one who chased the would-be Bullwinkle out of the yard. Even though Blondie can fill the back seat of a Suburban, you’d be wrong if you assumed she was the moose chaser.

It’s an understandable assumption. After all, a full-grown moose typically weighs between 800 and 1300 pounds and stands 6-7 feet high at the shoulder. You’d assume it would take a big noisy dog to scare off something that big and that mean, right?

The trouble with that theory is that Blondie is really of the species doggus fireplacus-snoozus, meaning she’d rather lay in front of the fireplace and snooze.

The dog that chased off the moose? Our Bichon Frise, Gigi (no, I didn’t name her<g>). That isn’t her in the photo above, but the dog in that photo looks just like her.

Gigi weighs all of 8-9 lbs and stands maybe 6″ tall at the shoulder. So I’m looking out the bathroom window into the back 40 and I see this little white wanna-be tasmanian devil yapping her brains out and this moose trotting off while looking over its shoulder looking like it wishes it were in another county.

Here it comes

Yeah, there’s a lesson there. You knew it was coming.

The assumption is that the big competitor can’t be made to blink – or in the case of the moose, can’t be made to take their marbles and go somewhere else.

Many times, that assumption is made because the competitor is “too big to fail”. Bet you’ve heard that a lot lately.

In the case of the moose, that would be my assumption as well. The likely reality is that the moose realized that this little yappy white critter coming after it with fangs bared and a maniacal yap (is that even possible?<g>) not only wasn’t scared of it, but wasn’t going to back off.

Suddenly, whatever brought the moose into the yard simply wasn’t worth it anymore. Trust me, I have those days with Gigi from time to time myself:)

The dirty little secret is that if the moose got close enough to Gigi, she probably would have run for the hills, but coming to that one particular spot just wasn’t attractive enough for the moose to chance it.

The moose doesn’t know what Gigi is capable of, much less willing to do in order to win the battle. Because it really doesn’t need this little corner of Montana in order to survive, it leaves.

Like Gigi, your ability to compete against a large, entrenched competitor is largely up to what’s inside of you.

Do I mean that you can sell more insulin or diabetic socks than Wal-Mart? Probably not.

On the other hand, in your market, you might be able to create a great success selling diabetic supplies to the right market by selling better than they do – simply because of delivery, service, insurance handling, convenience and so on.

Even Wal-Mart has weaknesses – some by design

Ever seen a drive-up window at a Wal-Mart? Ever seen a Wal-Mart delivery vehicle in a neighbor’s driveway?

Even in a market with a large, entrenched competitor, you’ll find things that your competitor is unable or unwilling to do. Things that the customer would be happy to have you do for them as part and parcel of delivering your product or service. There are *some* customers that will gravitate to you because of that.

Others wont care about delivery, drive-up, or whatever you use to differentiate. Let them go. Assuming that everyone is your ideal customer is a great way to bore the market to death (the death being that of your business).

Focus on the clientele who revels in or depends on the differences you offer.

What would your competitor simply hate to find you doing in “their” market? What could they do if they wanted to that would really please their customer – but they wont because of their compliance department, laziness or their business model?

Be the Gigi of your market. Defend your corner of the yard like a maniacal, fluffy little dog that is convinced it cannot lose.

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Download audio file (DisneyBirthdays.mp3)

photo credit: Thomas_Jung

You know, we’ve talked about this before. 

I’m speaking of the marketing value of keeping track of your customers’ birthdays. 

I know, I know. People won’t give them to you. If so, it’s because you aren’t asking the right way – or you aren’t making the sale.

This is a sale as well. If you told them they were getting something of value as a gift in exchange for telling you what month they were born, most people will sign up. You don’t need the day or the year in order to give them something special for their birthday. 

Don’t waste energy worrying about the ones who don’t join your birthday program – spend your energy on making sure your offer is doing a good job of illustrating the value of the birthday program. 

In the past, we talked about the restaurants (for example) that use this to fill their reservation calendar. Even if you don’t take reservations, you can use this strategy. 

These days, even Disney is doing it

Recently, Disney started offering a free day pass to their parks on their guest’s birthday. If you’ve been to Disney or looked at their pricing, you know that this is not a cheap gift. A one day pass to Disney World is $75.

So why would they do this?

The same reason you should be offering a free dessert or entree or buy-one-get-one (or half or whatever) to your customers on their birthday – because almost no one eats alone on their birthday.

If your family of 4 goes out to Uncle Ralphie’s Gourmet Pizza for dinner tonight for dad’s birthday because dad gets to eat free – you’re still going to buy a meal for everyone else at the table.

Obviously you have to know your numbers to make the right kind of offer, and you might have to tweak it over time, but there’s no reason why it shouldn’t be a profitable event on average.

As for Disney’s reasoning – it’s no different.

Who goes to Disney World by themselves? Sure, there are exceptions. Do you make decisions based on the actions of the 1% or 99%?

Speaking of… happy birthday, Russ. (See, that wasn’t so hard)

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Former FEMA Director Michael Brown

One of the natural reactions to a CPSIA discussion with store owners, manufacturers, the press and other business people that I speak to about the Act is “Oh, the government would never do anything to shut down an entire niche of businesses, especially in this economy.”

Well, they would be wrong.

Take a long, hard look at the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1919 and reversed in 1933 (depression, anyone?)

Regardless of how you feel about the consumption of alcoholic beverages, think long and hard about how that hurt a specific niche of businesses (bars, breweries, dance halls, distilleries, night clubs and similar), and what the situation has in common with today’s CPSIA fiasco.

It isn’t just about the bars and the drunks. Moms and dads lost their jobs.

I’m from the government and I’m here to help you

Now, are you so sure that the Federal government – or more accurately, Congress – wouldn’t intentionally do something that might impact an entire industry – intentional or otherwise?

That’s what the CPSIA will do to the segment of the children’s product industry that doesn’t depend on massive manufacturing plants in China (clothing, toys, books, you name it).

It might push those overseas plants to adhere to safety regulations (a welcome change from the People’s Republic of Melamine), but it also grants them the power to decimate much of their competition – simply due to economies of scale that finished product testing costs will burden handmade manufacturers with.

The CPSIA *favors* China with its “step-wise approach”

You heard me right. Large scale manufacturers can afford to do the testing. They simply have to raise their prices a little. It’s the little guy, the stay-at-home mom, the cottage industry shop that employs 12 local people – they are the ones whose business gets hammered by finished product testing costs by lot.

“This step-wise approach will impose immediate changes to protect children while giving manufacturers additional time to develop controls to ensure that all children’s products are free of lead.” (see http://oversight.house.gov/documents/20071003152943.pdf)

The reality is that the legislation isn’t limited to toys – even though Rep Pelosi *repeatedly* uses the term toy when talking about the CPSIA. Toys are not the only thing the law controls.

And yes, 6 months might be time enough for manufacturers to “develop controls” – even the small ones – if you gave manufacturers the ability to use component testing for products manufactured after the law becomes effective.

A Scout is no longer Thrifty

If you still think it wasn’t intentional…. Look long and hard at the “simple, commonsense” effort Representative Waxman and Senator Feinstein made to be sure that trouble to make the law retroactive, covering to all children’s products ever manufactured.

Operative text from the letter: “United States Senator Dianne Feinstein, California: This language unambiguously restricts not only the manufacture of these products following enactment, but also the retail sale of any children’s toy manufactured before this deadline.”

Thrift stores? Not on their radar. Doesn’t matter if they don’t have any intention of selling lead-infused baby bottles, doesn’t matter if they are a specialty resale shop that only sells clothes made from organic US-grown cotton and wool: they can’t even take a chance, because they can’t afford to test anything given their margins.

Being thrifty could become a lot more difficult if the law stands as written.

I don’t even like “lead” pencils

Again, no one wants lead in stuff made for kids. Likewise, not everyone wants to close their business and go work at Wal-Mart or what not.

Yet that’s clearly the direction that the CPSIA is driving many small businesses because the economics of testing using XRF and digestive technologies couldn’t possibly have been considered in the sphere of homemade products and similar items.

They’re PROUD of what they’re forcing businesses to do, without a second thought to the smaller businesses that will be forced to close or cut children’s product lines because they have no way to reasonably test their products in an economical fashion.

One thing becomes clear when you did around for comments made by the lead (heh heh) proponents of the CPSIA: Small businesses and work at home moms weren’t even on their radar.

And they still aren’t. It hasn’t been that long since the CPSC’s spokesperson dismissed those working against the CPSIA in a derisive tone, calling them “mommy bloggers”.

Be careful. Those mommy bloggers just might buy a swift boat, if you know what I mean.

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photo credit: Derek Farr ( DetroitDerek )

Several of my friends are in the artist community, both here in Montana and elsewhere.

Many of them are photographers like you’d suspect, but some paint.

I don’t really look at myself as an artist even though I’ve been a photographer in one form or another since I was a kid.

Recently, one of them told me that she was able to rent mall space for her photography studio due to an innovative program in the St. Louis area.

The economy has put a lot of pressure on malls across the nation. Vacancies are way up, and the situation is no different at this mall.

One mall thought differently

The mall’s management could have sat back and whined about their situation. They could have let the mall traffic dwindle and left those spaces vacant. That might have impacted them legally, depending on their contracts with anchor stores.

But they didn’t. Instead, they came up with an innovative program that helps their cash flow, helps the local art community (and the small business owners – the artists) as well as keeping traffic up in the mall.

You can review a TV station news video about the project here.

Think outside the box store.

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photo credit: DeclanTM

Yesterday, I was in a box store (cuz no one here in Columbia Falls carries the items I needed) and sauntered by an iPod Touch on a whim.

We’ve talked a few times about the productivity that some custom iPhone applications would have for your business. You might not know that there are no Montana cell carriers that can offer the iPhone (yet), so the iPod Touch is a reasonable alternative if cell-driven applications aren’t important to you. 

Ok, so maybe it wasn’t entirely a whim:)

As you might expect, a salesperson walked up to me and asked if I had any questions. Trouble was, I actually did:)

I suspect that I’m not your typical user of tools like this and I don’t think he was prepared for my not-too-mainstream questions. 

I asked about syncing the iPod Touch’s contacts and calendars list with my Outlook. He wasn’t sure if that worked or not, but he thought it might. 

As you might imagine, I don’t spend $300 on “I think it might”. 

Next, I asked if it does do syncing with Outlook, does it require iTunes to make that sync happen.  He wasn’t sure. 

Note: I’ve since found out that both of those questions are true. It does sync to Outlook and it does use iTunes to make that happen.

Are you ready to service the early adopters?

The problem: If you’ve read Freakonomics or Crossing the Chasm (written for software companies, but applicable to all businesses IMO), you know that the early adopter types are instrumental in exposing new products like iPhones and iPods (and new services) to a much larger group of potential customers. 

If your staff isn’t prepared to deal with the not-always-mainstream questions that these early adopters have, it’s likely that they will lose the sale. 

These days, many people walk into the store with model numbers, prices and specs in their phone or on a note. They know what their choices are. Reviews and every other possible piece of info is available to them BEFORE they arrive at the store. 

What this means is that when the prospective buyer enters the store, it’s less about selling them the item and far more about helping them choose *which* item fits them best. 

You don’t know what you’re missing

The scary thing is that you’ll never know about the customers you lost because a question like this didn’t get answered.

All it takes to make this a really expensive problem for you is something like this:

One owner of a business (or the owner’s tech guru) walks into your store and asks the same type of questions (and perhaps more). You have no idea that their business has 100 salespeople and technicians in the field. You have no idea that they want to find out if the iPod Touch would work for their remote staff as a custom business application they’ve discussed for deployment on the iPod Touch or iPhone.

Depending on which model they were going to buy, that’s a $30,000 or $40,000 sale. 

This sort of thing happens far more often than you’d expect. 

Training your sales staff is expensive, but not training them is even more costly. Even if two or three of your staff are “ultra-trained” and can be the resource for the remaining staff, that would be an improvement.

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photo credit: jsgphoto

Obama made reference to it Tuesday during his Inaugural Address, acknowledging that many say he can’t do all the things he’s got on his agenda.

Maybe so, maybe not.

Admittedly, his obstacles are substantial.

Some might assume they are insurmountable, specifically those 500 or so people in the Capitol building.

The thing is, that’s  just the kind of situation that often makes people succeed well beyond their own expectations, much less the expectations of others who have counted them out.

Ask Joe Namath, Roger Staubach or John Elway about being counted out.

On second thought, do that later. I’m not here to talk to you about those 4 guys – I’m here to talk to you about you.

Got obstacles?

Who’s counted YOU out? Neighbors? Friends? Family? That little parrot on your shoulder?

Your obstacles probably shrink in comparison to the ones faced by Presidents, but they still might be daunting for you.

So what? Act in parallel and make em all wrong.

What exactly do I mean by parallel?

Most people act sequentially. They think “I’ll do this project, then this project, then that project.” We’ve been taught that way, at least most of us. Learning anything different is often something you stumble across. A failed project acted on sequentially is like a losing season.

Most really successful people tend to act in parallel. They often have a dozen or more projects going on at once. If one of them sticks to the wall, fine. If not, those other 11 projects will pick up the slack. A failed project is just one of the many things they’re counting on, rather than an entire losing season, it’s more like an incomplete pass.

Sure, you’re wondering how they get it all done. How do they juggle a dozen projects when one is enough to drive you crazy?

I promise you one thing: it sure doesn’t happen by accident.

How do they get parallel without going postal?

• They have a mentor. Even *billionaires* have mentors, coaches, confidants or mastermind groups. Don’t imagine for a minute that Bill Gates plays bridge with Warren Buffett just for fun, nor that Buffett does because he can’t find anyone else to play cards with him. Look Tiger Woods can spank any golfer on the planet, yet he still has a coach to help him keep improving. Who do you have?
• They have systems in place to relieve themselves of tedious crap. I’m talking about the same stuff that bogs down your day, interrupts you during productive stretches (you DO have those, don’t you?) and create piles of minimum wage labor on your desk – work that you end up doing yourself.
• They’ve surrounded themselves with people as smart or smarter than themselves. Their ego isn’t driving the bus. Quite often, they do this to relieve themselves of time-consuming manual labor – often technical skills like copywriting and web design.

Acknowledging the theme of the day, Abe Lincoln is quoted as saying that if he had 8 hours to cut down a tree, he’d first spend 6 hours sharpening his saw. What sharpens your saw?

Jim Rohn says that “You become the average of the 5 people you surround yourself with.” No, that doesn’t mean you should go stand in a circle of supermodels<g>. Seriously…Who have you surrounded yourself with?

Get Parallel. Show the parrot who’s in charge.

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photo credit: apesara

One of the questions I hear with regularity is “Where do I get ideas for new products and services?” Of course, the most obvious place would be “Your customers”.

It isn’t that easy though. If every business waited for their customers to ask for that next amazing new product, a lot of great new products and services wouldn’t come to market nearly as soon. Some might not ever come to market.

Did one of Apple’s customers ask them for the iPod? Not likely. 

What’s the biggest problem your customers have that you aren’t doing anything to solve?

Sometimes you need to be ahead of your customers’ thought process.

If you’ve positioned your business well, you are the authority in your market (and if you aren’t, you should be working on that).

You are the one that everyone looks to for the newest information in your market. You are the one that everyone looks to for the newest products that help them with problems they didn’t realize they even had.

But how do you do that?

Staying on top of your market means reading about trends and new discoveries in your industry’s publications. It doesn’t matter if that means a trade paper, a blog, a podcast, a video or a monthly conference call, you simply have to not only keep up but stay ahead of the “also rans”.

What more business owners should do is spend time reading about trends and new discoveries in complementary business niches. The really aggressive folks should be looking at these things in niches that appear to have nothing to do with their business.

For example, if you sell bicycles in a specialty retail shop, what would be the point of reading about the newest strategies used by those who retail kayaks or rent high-end digital SLRs, telescopes or ice climbing gear?

Simple – the customers who spend money in those markets are also inclined to spend money in your specialty bike shop.

Looking at ideas that worked in non-complementary markets has value as well. What can you take from successes in a completely unrelated niche, bring to your business, massage a little and make your own?

Plenty, if you put a little thought into it.

How many businesses have drive-up windows these days?

Do you think coffee shops, libraries or dry cleaners were the first? Nope. Oddly enough, the first drive up window appears to have been at a bank in 1928.

20 years later in 1948, In-and-Out Burger claims they opened the first drive-up window at a restaurant. Why it took the restaurant business 20 years to pick up on that is anyone’s guess.

Sometimes, you might be replacing a product line instead of simply adding a new one to widen your reach. In extreme cases, it might be about survivability.

For example, if you’re one of the many businesses that is threatened by the CPSIA, you’re looking at eliminating product lines for kids under 12. Presumably, you have items for kids over 12, but that isn’t always the case.

What else can you use to generate ideas for new products and services? We’ll talk about other ways shortly.

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Over Christmas, my grandpa told me all about the CPSIA. Big people probably know it as the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act.

Do you have any idea how long it took me to learn to say that without messing it up? Those are big words for a 6 month old, even a cute one like me.

I learned the big words from my grandpa. He came to see me over Christmas and I overheard him talking to my great-grandpa about this new law.

When they talk while they’re holding me, I look up at them and bat my big blue eyes. It makes them talk funny to me. When they go back to their conversation they think I’m not paying attention, but I am.

I could tell you their checking account numbers, but I wont. We girls know everything about our men – even the grandpas.

The CPSIA is like a poopy diaper that’s leaking around the edges. It irritates my bottom and it gets all over everything. It gives me a world-class case of diaper rash. So bad that not even Gold Bond medicated powder makes it feel better.

Why the poopy diaper?

Well, my grandpa gave me lots of reasons to be cranky by talking to great-grandpa about the CPSIA when I was in the room. He said they forgot to think about the nice mommy who sits at home and takes care of her kids. In her spare time, she made my little homemade baby booties.

He also told my great-grandpa about all the other moms who make nice stuff for babies like me. Pretty dresses, books, booties, furniture, and a whole bunch of things for older kids like my cousin Daniel.

Grandpa talks about XRF

Grandpa made me laugh, but I didn’t let him notice. He only thinks I can smile right now. I heard him talking about all the things that small retailers and kids product makers could do to get attention from important people about this CPSIA thing.

A couple of his ideas sounded like good ways to get the local media interested in the CPSIA. He said they really like stories with irony. I’m not sure what irony is, but hey, I’m only 6 months old.

Grandpa said the press likes stories about politicians. I like it when grandpa tells me stories. There’s always nice people and animals in them. Politicians must be nice people if the press likes stories about them.

One idea he talked about was getting someone to use a XRF scanner to test all the kid toys in the gift shops in the Senate office building, House, Smithsonian and other Federal buildings that tourists like to visit.

Another idea I heard him talking about was getting a Senator to pose for a video or photo while giving a flag to a young kid – and then testing the flag with that XRF thing. He sure says “XRF” a lot these days.

It sounded like the thought he wouldn’t be able to take the XRF thing into those fancy buildings, but he said they could just buy some stuff inside, walk out front and test them while on video. He said to be sure and have some local press on the scene.

He didn’t explain what all that XRF stuff meant, so I urped on him just to remind him to explain everything. A girl has to know what her grandpa is up to.

Grandpa’s meeting

After he cleaned up the spitup, grandpa talked about what to do in a meeting of people who weren’t aware of CPSIA. He said something about a chamber of commerce meeting. At the beginning of his meeting, everyone in the room is sitting down having lunch. One at a time, they stand and introduce themselves, then they sit back down.

When he got up to introduce himself, he asked for the group’s patience to go through a quick exercise.

He asked them these questions:

• If you make or sell toys, shoes or clothing for kids, please stand up.
• If you write, illustrate, sell or distribute books, please stand up.
• If you make or sell diapers or diaper covers, please stand up.
• If you make or sell home furnishings, bean bag chairs, bedding, cribs or anything else for a child’s bedroom, playroom or nursery, please stand up.
• If you work in a library, please stand up.
• If you have a gift shop in your hotel, campground, resort or bed and breakfast, please stand up.
• If you create, sell or rent outdoor gear or backpacks for kids under 12, please stand up.
• If you create or sell jewelry or accessories for kids, please stand up.
• If you create, illustrate, make music for, sell or rent electronics or video games, please stand up.
• If you run an antique store that sells anything for kids under 12, like toys and clothes, please stand up.
• If you write, publish, sell or distribute school supplies, educational materials or science kits, please stand up.

He pointed at the group standing and said, “All these people are affected by the new children’s product safety law”, noting that he had left some brief info on their lunch tables to look at after the meeting.

He told them that as of Feb 10 if they had anything in their stores that didn’t have a CPSIA compliance certificate, they could be fined $100k for selling non-compliant items – even if they were already in inventory before Feb 10th.

I’m not sure what that inventory thing is, but it sounds expensive. I need to ask for one when I learn to talk. Grandpa loves to buy me stuff.

The other shoe drops

Grandpa’s questions got worse. He asked everyone in the room to look around at the people standing.

He said “If you have a client, dealer or a supplier standing, stand up and join them.”  Next he said, “Look at all the people standing. If they or any of their employees spend money at your business, please stand up.”

Then he told them that everyone who wasn’t standing probably wasn’t affected by the CPSIA – except that all the people standing might have a lot less money to spend around town because of the impact of CPSIA testing and compliance.

Finally he said “If you have any questions, see me after the meeting”, thanked the group for their cooperation, and sat down.

That’s how I remember it, but I was kind of distracted by a bottle when he was talking to great-grandpa.

Small business colic

I’m so colic-y about the CPSIA, I just wanna spit up all over the people who voted this in without thinking about all the moms who stay home with their little kids and make pretty dresses and things for girls like me.

PS: No, I’m not 6 months old in that photo, are you kidding? I’m so much bigger now. My grandpa really likes that picture. It’s from back when I was 2 months old, just a baby, not a big girl like I am now.

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photo credit: hans s

This week, a series of #CPSIA posts about what to do next and how to get the word out to other manufacturers, retailers, the media in your area and perhaps most importantly – to your elected officials. If you want to forge ahead with your homemade products business despite CPSIA, then read on.

If you don’t have any direct reason to care about dealing with the CPSIA (you should have an indirect reason to care), don’t worry – there are other posts this week that will help you with your business. I haven’t forgotten about the rest of you, it’s simply that this CPSIA issue is very time-bound and it’s important to deal with a number of issues relating to it before Feb 10 arrives.

If you’ve given up, read on anyway. You might develop enough hope to get back in the game. 

Surviving the February 10th deadline

I’m assuming that you got this far because you haven’t given up and you’re wondering what to do in the next few weeks before the CPSIA kicks in.

Before Feb 10th gets here, you’ll need a few things in your quiver.

If you’re a retailer, you’ll need a CPSIA General Compliance Certificate (GCC) for every item (or every lot of items) that you sell. The manufacturer of the items should provide these, it is not your responsibility as a retailer to test and create the certificates (sort of).

Why “sort of”? Because it IS your responsibility after Feb 10 to sell only those things for which you have GCC coverage. A nice catch-22. If you buy items from the same lot, each item is covered by the GCC for that lot. Still, each lot must have a GCC.

Yes, you’re right – there is a significant paperwork tracking issue here: You get to keep track of a form for every lot of every item you sell or have sold. We’ll get to that later in the week.

As for the items that won’t comply as of Feb 10, big retail (Wal-Mart, etc) is handling this by demanding that manufacturers accept returns on unsold merchandise that doesn’t comply. You may not have that option with your suppliers, but it is worth checking into. 

CRITICAL: You should be sure that all future contracts to purchase from your distributors and wholesale suppliers include a clause that allows you to return the items at the manufacturer’s cost (and for a full refund) if they are not CPSIA compliant.

What if my manufacturers say that providing the GCC isn’t their responsibility? Or what if they say they haven’t tested. Obviously, your actions here will depend on how bad you want their merchandise, but the bottom line is that while they do have to provide you with a GCC, finger pointing will do you no good if a CPSC inspector walks in your door.

You either need to get the manufacturer’s GCC, have the items tested yourself, or simply don’t buy from that manufacturer. If you sell those items, you’ve got the ultimate responsibility to have a GCC for each item or lot of items. 

What about my existing inventory?

For retailers, the choices here are slim: Either discard the items, return them to the manufacturer (if you can) or have them tested.

You can’t legally sell them if you don’t have a GCC. It might be tempting to simply sell them and try to run the non-compliant items out of stock after Feb 10. I wouldn’t advise that. Fines are $100,000 for violating the CPSIA.

Sure, it’s a roll of the dice whether you see an inspector or not, but if you do see one, it’ll probably be when you least expect it. Most small retailers I work with are not in a position to handle a rand0m $100,000 fine. Even if you are, you probably have better things to do with that money:)

If you are a manufacturer, you must test items and provide GCCs to your retailers on a lot by lot basis. If possible, provide an online area of your website where retailers can look them up by SKU and by lot number. Easy for you, easy for them. By the way, if you import items from outside the U.S. – you’re the manufacturer, so don’t assume you can skirt the issue that way. 

As for those GCCs, I’d also consider including a copy in every shipment’s paperwork, since one must be provided for each lot. Be sure that lot numbers appear on invoices, bills of lading and packing slips.

If you have an online system to look up your GCCs, I’d suggest that you print the URL of the GCC for that lot on all that paperwork as well. It gives the retailer no excuses when it comes to recognizing that you’ve provided a GCC. In fact, doing this offers your clients some options that your competition may not offer.

Always look for an edge – and making CPSIA compliance easier for your retailers is certainly a plus at a time when they are all pretty worried about how they are going to deal with this unfunded mandate on their time and record keeping resources. 

If you are a manufacturer who sells retail (ie: most people who make things in their own home, shop etc), then you still need to have your items tested. There are some exceptions, but they are pretty slim pickings, like natural fabrics that haven’t been dyed, inked or coated with any other material. If you are unsure, I suggest talking with an attorney who is familiar with the CPSIA. 

So…whether you are a retailer, manufacturer or both, that’ll get you working till August.

What about August?

August is “tomorrow” in the real world. You know that you’ll blink and it’ll be here. 

So what do you do to get ready for August? Well, it really depends on your products.

XRF testing is – so far – off the table as of August, when your merchandise must be tested by a certified third party testing lab. Problem is, the CPSC doesn’t have to issue the rules for a post-August CPSIA world until May. Until then, choose your merchandise wisely. As the rules flesh out over the next few months, we’ll come back to this topics from a post-August retail worldview.

That means you have that 100% inventory turn challenge twice this year. Don’t wait till the last minute – and again, if you are a retailer, be sure your purchase agreements with suppliers are iron-clad. I’d suggest that you try to stock your store with merchandise that is already compliant with August’s rules if at all possible.

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photo credit: pixeljones

Earlier today, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) issued a press release to clarify their intent regarding the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) as it relates to thrift stores, resale shops and the like.

The full press release can be found here, but the operative text is this:

The new law requires that domestic manufacturers and importers certify that children’s products made after February 10 meet all the new safety standards and the lead ban. Sellers of used children’s products, such as thrift stores and consignment stores, are not required to certify that those products meet the new lead limits, phthalates standard or new toy standards.

The new safety law does not require resellers to test children’s products in inventory for compliance with the lead limit before they are sold. However, resellers cannot sell children’s products that exceed the lead limit and therefore should avoid products that are likely to have lead content, unless they have testing or other information to indicate the products being sold have less than the new limit. Those resellers that do sell products in violation of the new limits could face civil and/or criminal penalties

Make note that thrift stores and resellers are not off the hook entirely, but that common sense changes were made to deal with a real world situation. Sort of.

Saying that old items aren’t subject to the law is one thing, until you turn around and say that the lead rules must still be obeyed. No one wants to be feeding kids lead with their Cocoa Krispies, but for once, it’d be nice if the CPSC would talk out of only one side of their mouth at a time.

Keep the pressure on, folks.

We still need to see better handling of the testing requirements for one of a kind (OOAK) and small lot manufacturers. Not to exempt them, simply to make their requirements fit their abilities rather than bankrupting them.

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photo credit: midiman

Random thoughts get me in trouble sometimes. Today I got a call from the service manager of one of our local Chevy dealers.

Every February, the troop helps them by hand washing 250-280 cars during the dealer’s annual customer care clinic. It’s a brilliant free event that gets the dealer’s customers into the showroom for 30-40 minutes, feeds them, offers them door prizes, and most importantly – gets their cars run through the shop for a head to toe diagnostic/safety once-over by their certified mechanics.

In addition to finding some safety issues that could be fatal because they stranded you somewhere remote during our Montana winters, it also does a nice job of filling out the repair shop’s appointment book for a couple of months. 

After the inspection once-over is done, it gives the Scouts a chance to be seen in public doing something people appreciate (ie: handwashing their cars in February in Montana – albeit in a heated auto shop).

Anyhow, that conversation and the related thought process got me to thinking about The Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA otherwise known as HR4040) and Scouting. Yes, its a bit of a tangent, but I got there, so let’s move on.

Patches, Pinewood and Pants

Im wondering if Boy Scouts of America (BSA) National Headquarters is aware that the CPSIA drastically tightens the rules for the sale and manufacture of children’s products, including clothing, furniture, toys and other items (basically, *everything* created for a young child).

Patches, gear and uniforms will fall under this law for Scouts in younger age groups. Old gear AND gear *currently in inventory* that has not been tested CANNOT BE SOLD, by Scout shops, on eBay, by retail stores, etc.

Even Cub Scout Pinewood Derby car kits are impacted. No manufacturers – not even one-of-a-kind (OOAK) products are exempted.

They didn’t leave out the Girl Scouts, of course.  All their gear and clothing are also under the watchful eye of this law.

The gear, patches and clothing currently in inventory is what will cause the most interest by BSA National because 300+ council offices have lots of stuff in inventory in their stores and summer camp trading posts. 

All of it has to be certified or tested, or it must be removed from sale on Feb 10th. Or someone has to find an exemption. Right now, there are no exemptions.

Why pick on the kids?

This law was written primarily to deal with large multi-national firms importing containers of lead-tainted junk toys, so the fines are substantial.

This law is big trouble for people who make homemade clothing/toys/furniture, for diaper services, for resale shops, those making their living on ebay/etsy.com and many others (including everyone they buy items from to make their business run).

Lots of effort is taking place to try and get it fixed, but its already a law and many of the rules have yet to be written by the CPSC – despite the fact that the major components of the law go into effect on Feb 10. As written, the law impacts everyone.

Im curious if this is even remotely on the BSA’s radar because it will impact every council scout shop and every retailer who carries Scout items, new or used.

It will impact all the ordering of gear, patches and so on for NOAC 2009, for the 45,000+ attendees of the 100th Anniversary National Scout Jamboree at Camp A.P. Hill in Virginia, and every summer camp’s trading post for the 2009 season (and so on). That’s a lot of stuff. 

Is the CPSIA a surprise for you? You’re in luck

Ive posted a number of articles about the CPSIA, so if this is the first you’ve heard about it, I’d suggest starting your CPSIA education here and I would also suggest calling the BSA National office and ask them about CPSIA compliance of items from BSA National Supply. Don’t bother your council office with this (unless you’re on the council board) because they really can’t do much about it other than make sure they are ordering from CPSIA-compliant vendors.

In the meantime, you might also see if your Scout shop has a sale on Pinewood Cars – and buy your model car paint early. At present, there’s no telling what the status of model paints will be after Feb 10.

The reach of this law never ceases to amaze me.

Have you called your Senators’ DC offices?

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photo credit: ckindel

For months, my youngest son has been saving for a new set of skis. Given the instant gratification culture we’re surrounded by, its a good thing to watch a kid save his shekels for a few months for something he really wants.

The timing is good for him to reach his goal, as we’ve gotten over 5 feet of snow on the mountain in the last 7 days. Skiers and snowboard riders are in heaven around here.

On Saturday, it was payday. He finally went to pick up his new skis (Elan something – you can tell I’m not a ski geek). He took them to a local ski house to get bindings mounted and fitted to his (also new) vacuum-fitted boots. The store is known for having an expert repair staff and this sort of work is critical to safely enjoying a pair of skis.

So he drops off the skis and asks if he can have them the next day. No problem, they say.

“No problem”

When he calls, they aren’t ready and in fact, it turns out they haven’t been started because the experts forgot to ask for details like weight and skier skill level – important factors in setting up bindings. He’s a patient kid (not sure where he got that from) so 90 minutes later, he goes to pick them up only to be told that he can’t have them.

Why? Because he’s not 18. 

He can’t enter into a legal contract because he’s a minor. The contract? A likely unenforceable “legal document” aka waiver of liability for injuries that might occur as a result of some problem with the repair/binding installation. 

Until a parent signs the waiver, his skis are held hostage. 

Because of that little detail, a parent (that’s me) has to stop what they’re doing and drive 25 minutes each way to the store to sign a piece of paper that is more than likely unenforceable. Why unenforceable? Because if someone has valid cause to sue and an expert can prove the binding install (for example) was the cause of an accident, this 5×9 piece of paper isn’t going to make much difference. 

Oddly enough, my son doesn’t have to get a signature to buy the skis. He doesn’t have to get a signature to buy boots, poles or bindings either. But he does have to get a signature if someone installs the bindings onto the skis for him.

It’s just our policy

When my son calls me to get his skis out of purgatory, I ask him to put the store guy on the phone.

When I question the ski shop guy, I get comments like “I just do the work” and “Its just our policy”.

Do I care if he just does the work? Do I care that “its just our policy”? Not even. When your staff answers questions like this – do your clients care? 

I’m not asking him why I have to sign the paper. I know that’s just something the store’s legal team cooked up because the industry advises they do so and I just have to tolerate it. 

I’m asking the ski repair guy why the store think it’s ok to take a kid’s money when they know the kid can’t consummate the sale and take delivery of their product.

I’m also asking them why they aren’t informing their customer at the time of the sale that picking up this item will require a parent signature. Telling them at that time, and perhaps sending them home with a form to allow for future pickups might prevent future customer service issues like this. 

Instead, I get nothing but policy speak. Bleah.

Making it better

What would have been better? Something like this:

“We require a parent signature because our management feels that most parents would want to know about purchases and repairs that have a potential to impact their child’s safety and experience on the slopes. While our legal team has their own reasons, we feel it’s important that parents are aware when we are selling certain items to their children. If you want to avoid this in the future, we’ve created an option for parents who don’t need at-purchase-time notification for each purchase. We started this program for our expert skiers and snowboard riders, like local world class snowboard rider Tanner Hall. If you trust the expertise of your kids, you can sign this special form that lets them get bindings and repairs done without parental interruption. The cool thing is that you still get a postcard in the mail each time they make a purchase covered by the agreement, so you know what’s going on.”

That’s what would have been better. 

Look, every customer realizes that businesses have to protect themselves, but they don’t have to care. 

Train your staff to communicate things in customer-centric reasoning, rather than “corporate legal” policy statements. That’s what the paperwork is for. Your staff is there to create and improve upon the relationship you have with your clients, not to spout policy.

So much for that day on the slopes

Going back to what happened with the store…By the time I drop what I’m doing and drive 25 minutes to the store to sign the waiver, it’s not even worth making the trip to the mountain because the lifts on the advanced slopes close at 3pm. What kind of taste does that leave in a customer’s mouth? My son spends more money at this store than I do. Far more:)

Bottom line: Make it easy to do business with your company. If you have policies in place that might be misunderstood by your clients or that might inconvenience them, explain them before they cause a problem and find ways to avoid the inconvenience altogether. This entire episode could have been avoided without reducing the company’s legal protection.

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photo credit: Valerie Everett

You may have noticed that I took a little rest from blogging over the last couple weeks. Some of it was planned, some was due to surprisingly infrequent access to the internet during our trip to Missouri and Tennessee ( one example: a Starbucks with TWO tables, both next to the door in single digit weather, yeah, sure – and that was the only access I found other than a Panera restaurant).

Yep, we drove from Montana to the Midwest and back. Other than the “joy” of 20 below temps in Wyoming during the trip south, the trip was very nice and the roads were clear for the entire trip once we got out of Montana. The same can’t be said for my return home, where I found 2 feet of snow in my driveway and another foot the day after.

By the way, that 20 below thing is rare, but happens once or twice a year to keep the riffraff out:)

Normally when I leave town, I have posts automatically scheduled in Wordpress so that my schedule doesn’t interfere with keeping things moving here, but in this case I wanted to use experiences on the trip to seed those posts. I suppose the most noticeable seed from the trip is that in some areas, getting random access to the internet is a pain in the rump roast.  You wouldn’t think so in 2009, but that’s how it was.

Back to taking the time off. We all need it, of course. The only problem with taking time off from anything that you do regularly is that getting back into the game gets more difficult with each day that you’re gone.

People have asked me repeatedly how I manage to blog (almost) every single day. Quite simply, its a habit. Even on the days I don’t write (which are few – even on this last trip), I’m either taking notes about a future article or writing offline.

The secret is that writing is like working a muscle. Left unused, it’ll atrophy. You don’t want your blogging muscles to atrophy, just like you don’t want any other muscles to do that.

Writing, blogging, working out, golfing, reading and many other things are simply habits that must be developed. They aren’t instinctive (which is a good thing). Why good? Because anyone can train themselves to do these things.

Make constant improvement a habit

Most importantly – for your business, at least – the habit of working ON your business is a critical path habit that you need to do daily.

Yes, I said daily.

Even if you only spend 15 minutes a day working on improving your business, you’ll be surprised how it becomes a part of you and your business process. Its something that really must become a part of your business. Being the goto person in your business is fine, just keep in mind that your business looks at you that way too, not just your clients.

You’re one of the few who can help it improve.
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