May 6, 2020 · 2:22 pm

Be Good To Yourself

I received a very disappointing email yesterday. I mean, in the scheme of the global crisis we’re facing, it’s a nit but it was disappointing nevertheless. It came from Ticketmaster letting me know that one of the shows to which I had tickets was being canceled. I’ve had several postponed already but this one was now completely off the board. Boo.

The show was Journey and the opening act was The Pretenders. Now before you comment on my musical taste being stuck somewhere in the late 1980s, let me say that I saw Journey a year or so ago (with Def Leppard) and it was a phenomenal show. I’ve not seen The Pretenders in probably close to 30 years and being able to hear them live again was a huge bonus. Maybe next summer.

It did get me thinking about a Journey song, however, that I think is a good reminder to us all these days. It’s called “Be Good To Yourself” and it starts out describing a situation many of us might be in as we’re staying home and trying to work (or find work) as best we can:

Running out of self-control
Getting close to an overload
Up against a no-win situation

Here’s the video – I picked one that features Steve Perry singing and check out Randy Jackson’s haircut!

The song reminds us to be good to ourselves. I forget to do that sometimes and maybe you do too. Maybe you put a lot of pressure on yourself to be as productive as you were before all of this. That’s crazy talk. No one should expect themselves to be superhuman and deliver the same 100% rate of output during a global pandemic and a lockdown.

We all have worries during this time. Maybe it’s a fear of getting sick. Maybe it’s even more real than that prospect because you’ve lost your job and are depleting your savings. Maybe your health insurance is ending because you’re unemployed. When we have issues that lie at the base of Maslow’s hierarchy, there is no question that we put pressure on ourselves to solve the problem. You feel overwhelmed by a lack of control. I get it and I’m not minimizing it.

But you still need to take some time each day and be good to yourself. You didn’t create this situation. You’re not to blame. That can be taking the time you now have to walk each day and clear your head. Maybe you make a list of the things you really enjoy and do one every day. Maybe you call a friend to whom you’ve not spoken in a while. The key is not to beat yourself up over the situation. Negative self-talk just digs a deeper hole.

So I’ll shut up and let you think about how you’ll be good to yourself today. OK?

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May 1, 2020 · 3:51 pm

Pivoting From Cocktails To Cleaning

Happy Foodie Friday! This week our food-themed screed takes us to the land of alcohol, a place that I have a feeling many of you have visited several times over the last few weeks as a scenic detour in your home confinement. Like many of you, part of my very limited activities over the last little bit has been the often quixotic search for hand sanitizer and toilet paper. The good news is that toilet paper seems to be much easier to find of late while sanitizer remains elusive.

There are many small distilleries near where I live which make everything from vodka to rum to moonshine (hey, it is the South!). Many of them have converted their processes over to produce hand sanitizer which is after all, alcohol-based. One place nearby is selling their sanitizer by the gallon at prices which are reasonable, thereby doing both their shareholders and our community a service. Why the shareholders? Because many of their customers, along with those of their competitors, happen to be restaurants and bars, which are closed except for carry-out. Booze sales are confined to beer and wine in the carry-out world for the most part. That’s our thinking point today.

These businesses have managed to pivot from making one in-demand product to another. This pandemic has caused many other businesses to rethink how they do things as well and to make some changes. For example, I represent a number of companies that run after-school programs. With no school (and no gatherings allowed), most of them have pivoted to providing those programs online. When things calm down, they’ll return to their old model but most indicate they’ll keep the new, online model as well since it seems to be working quite well.

Another example. Companies are cutting down on non-essential costs.  They are reallocating their budget from physical in-person processes such as travel, conventions, etc. into digital or virtual tactics. If your primary sales channel is trade shows, are you ready to pivot to some other model since consumers might be wary of large gatherings such as home shows and business buyers may not be allowed to travel to whatever conventions remain?

Has online commerce been an afterthought for your business? My guess is that many brick and mortar firms are rethinking how they approach digital. Yes, all retail sales have dropped. Consumers are restricting their purchasing to essentials, understandably. But it won’t be this way forever. As CNBC quoted one analyst,

“Major retailers who sell goods outside of apparel and furniture – two of the hardest-hit categories – will likely weather the downturn, along with many direct-to-consumer brands that were doing well before the pandemic. Instead of bulldozing the entire retail market, the pandemic is more likely to accelerate the decline of the “boring middle of retail,” such as Sears, J.C. Penney, Macy’s and Kohl’s.”

Those are companies that didn’t invest in the online space before and who can’t keep up with the big guys or the specialty online brands. They can’t pivot.

Being able to pivot is going to be critical as the new world emerges. Can you turn your booze into sanitizer without missing a beat or will you have to rip the whole business down and start over?

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April 29, 2020 · 3:47 pm

A Whole New World

The thing you hear often these days is some expression to get back to “normal.” The truth be told, those days are gone for good, I’m afraid and I’m not sure that it’s a bad thing in many ways. I’ve been thinking a lot about what the “new” normal looks like because as I’m talking to folks about franchises, some of the businesses that I would have recommended a few months ago are suddenly not as attractive as they were then. Others have emerged as having even more potential.

I want to share some thoughts with you today mostly to get you thinking about what the new normal is for your business. The first thing you’ve probably noticed, maybe because it’s affected you directly, is how many people are working from home. Business meetings take place virtually. I’ve seen a number of professional conferences rescheduled from some hotel ballroom to a virtual meeting place.

What will this do to the real-estate business? If you’re leasing 10,000 square feet of office space now but find you’re being just as productive with the staff working remotely, can that 10,000 become just enough space for a few offices and a conference room? Maybe investing in secure networking is a better use of funds. Some 60% report being either as productive or even more productive than they were working from the office according to a recent study and once the economy reopens, 24% say they’d like to work either entirely or more from home compared to how they worked before,

What will this do to the convention business, at least in the near term? Yes, there is huge value in the face time and spontaneous meetings conventions provide, but I’m not sure people will want to travel. Business travelers are the highest-profit customers airlines and hotels have. Between executives not needing to travel as much and vacation travelers being scared to, what happens to the travel business?

I worked in sports for many years. I’ve seen where some organizations are talking about revamping arena and stadium seating to spread their customers out. Of course, this will reduce capacity quite a bit. What does that do to the economics of those sports (I’m looking at you, NHL) and entertainment shows (concerts, etc.) that are heavily dependant on ticket sales? Seating capacity is an issue for restaurants and bars too. How do movie theaters stay in business with reduced capacity and with an audience that’s now learned to enjoy the theater experience at home?

We need to be thinking about supply chain disruption. Does manufacturing come back here? Are new factories built with social distancing in mind? Does this accelerate the trend to automation since robots can’t catch a virus (well, at least not of the non-digital kind)? We also suddenly are aware that our economy rests squarely on the people who seem to be paid inversely to their importance. Nurses, truck drivers, meat cutters, and others on the front lines are compensated far below the worth that has become evident to us all over the last few months. How does this enter into the conversation when the time comes?

Those are just a few things that have popped into my brain while this disaster goes on. What do I say to folks I’m working with, many of whom have been forced to rethink their employment or who have chosen to? In a nutshell, I think these businesses are worth a strong look:

  • Senior care – people were already wanting to stay in their own homes as they age and the issues in senior group quarters during this have accelerated the trend;
  • Cleaning, both residential and commercial. Self-explanatory
  • Education – both afterschool programs and tutoring. People always spend on their kids and more schooling is going to take place online and at home. Traditional programs in the Arts, STEM, and other areas will be hurt, I believe, and parents will seek them elsewhere.
  • Pets – I can’t tell you how many people have acquired new pets during this time. It also seems all of a sudden that everyone I know is posting something about their pet. Pet supplies, pet boarding, and pet grooming. Dog training too, maybe, if the new puppy we have is any indication (the other 2 dogs don’t seem to be fans yet).

Those are a few of my thoughts. There are a number of other business sectors that look promising in the new world but the important thing is that we recognize that things have changed, probably forever. Have you thought about how that affects you and your business? Is it time for you to change as well?

 

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