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• 41: House Coffee is Pressing Pause For a While

  It’s not you, its us! With so much of our lives wrapped up in our entrepreneurial ventures , its tough (for us at least) to have conversations about our businesses when they are changing. We want to give you 100%, and unfortunately, right now we can’t. Thank you for sticking with us for these past amazing 41 episodes. We have grown and learned so much from you and from this experience! This isn’t goodbye, but rather see you later. Keep in touch with us: housecoffeepodcast@gmail.com

  Follow Maggie: @maggiefromm

  Follow Rich @coffeeposer

  Special thanks to the AMAZING and talented TJ McMaster who has mixed and produced every single episode of this show. We love you TJ and House Coffee Podcast wouldn’t exist without you!

  Transcript

  Intro:
  Hey, you’re drinking house coffee – unfiltered conversations brewed at the intersection of real estate life and coffee shop service. We’re Maggie and Rich – local business owners and friends sharing stories and welcoming you to pull up a chair with us. The door’s always open. Let us pour you a cup.

  Maggie:
  Do you believe in manifestation? Absolutely, not you. Don’t notice. How come? Just for the same reason you don’t think the Earth is flat. What? Just kidding. Just kidding, but actually kind of probably. I just don’t think I don’t I don’t. I don’t see. the forces that conspire to or day in the world I don’t see them operating that way. But you believe in a force that operates the world. ideally forces conspire do you believe in miracles? Yes. Okay. So what’s the difference in your mind between like I think the one you know should have manifest. I don’t know manifest. I don’t know the concept of manifestation well enough to speak like fluently or or authoritatively at all on this notion, but from what I understand of Concepts like it and and ways of thinking about things like it. the source of power or like Universal persuasion that context is what is me? Where I would be the originator or something of my will or some force acting upon, you know. Existence in some way would be it would be me and I don’t understand my power to affect things well enough. to actually say What I would be able to manifest. Okay, and if I did believe in manifestation, I think that the things I would manifest would be. Would be gnarly than I would even want. So um. I think it’s time to transform your faith. I mean your fear into Faith well. That’ll preach. I’ve been listening to yeah be Bernstein’s book The Universe has your back. and it’s I I listen to a podcast episode recently where she was a guest speaker and I’ve heard of her. I’ve like like listen to a couple Clips in a couple videos and I’ve heard of this book, but I’ve never really been into it. however, when I was like when I when I caught this episode of lipstick on the rim, she was one of the guests and I just like I was like, you know, what the heck I’ll check out her book. I’m looking for some inspiration and in a period of limbo right now and my life and so I started listening to it. and in true Maggie form I after I started listening to it, I bought the physical copy of it because I can like read along while the author is like reading it and it helps me retain information a lot better. And I’ve just been coming becoming more aware of my intentions with things and learning how to like change my perception. of different things like from a negative one to a a more like coming from a place so of like I guess love I don’t know really know how to describe it. I’m still learning and I would say from what I’ve learned so far on this book. I’m in chapter 3 that manifestation is not about just like willing things to happen. It’s more about like setting your intentions for things and like letting learning that like not not every like that. It is actually in your power because like if you project that something’s not going to happen. You know, they say words are powerful. If you say something’s not going to happen. You’re putting your mind yourself in a mindset of like scarcity, whereas like if you if you put yourself in a mindset of abundance, and you said intentions for like what you want to happen and write them down and find synchronous ways of things happening to you. I think that there’s a possibility that just changing your mindset around things can actually impact you for the better. and yeah, so one of my key takeaways so far is your projection is your perception? And I find that to be true about a lot of things. yeah, well you explained that well, thank you and how to enter in Yeah, appreciate hearing all that. So I think I think there’s different ways to think about. this right so so there are people who would who would hear about who there are people who would hear manifestation or or this this also kind of reminds me of like the law of attraction. which which is its own thing, right? And so people hear these these words and then they can turn on the filter that they they hear those things through and and and kind of throw out any thing that has to do with it rather than pick it apart for for what might be there, right? So I think the things that you just said are I don’t think there’s much to argue against no matter where you come from on what you said, right? Because so much of the way we approach life does come down to the way we think about things right? so it’s kind of a mindset deal and and regardless of where she’s coming from or if there’s a spiritual element to this that she intends to. cloak or have out in the open about it either way. There are certainly principles. I think that are there is a similar knowledge scientifically backed where you like. if you if the way you think affects what you do and and intentionality around things, you know that can go a long way you kind of create a self-fulfilling prophecy when you only expect the negative right potentially and so no issues with anything you’ve said about what you’ve gotten out of that book. Even for me. I could those are things I could put into practice so I don’t mean to say I’m I’m against things out of hands just because they they ring a certain Bell. Yeah, I do think there are spiritual. elements to existence and life and There’s a lot to be said and asked and thought through about that but the things. the principles so far at least that you’ve outlined here are really takeaways for anyone you could frame them. Yeah, and from a lot of different you could frame them differently depending, you know, almost no matter what kind of context you come from. For sure. That’s my take on that cool. So don’t hear me. Say I just Hate all those ideas or manifestation or I’m against things just because of what it’s called, you know? Yeah. Appreciate hearing those. Those are good thoughts. I think you for me. I tend to be a negative Nelly. Yeah, and and it’s been things kind of like the wrong way. Or just expect well, I’m worst, etc. Etc. Oh, yeah, and for myself, I’m a skeptical person in my core. And so I want to I want to be able to approach things with a more open mind. especially, you know going on these next few months and just like figuring out. like what roads what roads to take metaphorically speaking and It’s just been a I’m in a period of transition in my life right now in many areas. And so I am looking for some spiritual guidance to help me figure out like give help honestly give confidence to some of these decisions that I’m making. Yeah. Yeah, what have you been listening to? um Like it’s like I feel like I’ve been listening to a lot of different things since probably last time I was asked this question. So I just haven’t tough time to give what I’m most recently listened to probably the radio this morning, but Ramsay what else if I don’t listen if I’m listening to the radio, it’s that if I’m not listening to that, I’m listening to probably music if I’m in the car or podcasts. on what I’m doing, but I guess that I was going to say I found this band. recently super accidentally called whom and they came out of the 90s. Okay, like they’re kind of like early Smashing Pumpkins hmm Vibes. So like they were kind of thing coming out of that same. I don’t know what you call it. Noisy Rock maybe or something else. I don’t know. They like Modest Mouse they seem to have come and gone over the years like over the decades. It’s kind of interesting. They haven’t released a lot of music but they’ve released music over a long span of time at any any songs that we would know. I I don’t I guess they had one like not a one-hit wonder but they had like one song that was like a radio hit. I guess and called. I mean, let’s see if I don’t even remember it wasn’t when I recognized and when I heard it I was like this was a song on the radio. It wasn’t the kind of like catchy Poppy’s song that. Let’s make the radio. I’m trying to look at. home h u m it’s um the way I found that band was because I found another band on Instagram and they were playing a cover song of a hum song because the drummer the post was kind of like a tribute post because the drummer who don’t have passed away in 2021. Oh, okay. He was over the age of 50 so they gives you a sense of well first, I mean, that’s young but like that was a sense of how Long has been around a bunch of kids. Don’t yeah, I don’t know what song. All right, I think of one. But I like they released a record in 2020. out of kind of nowhere But then oh Stars I think is is the one it’s called stars. But if you like listen to it and read the lyrics it’s like what is this song about? Why was it hot? Are you playing it? I wasn’t I wasn’t gonna play it on the pope. But will you play just like a little it sounds Melancholy, yeah, it’s got that Melancholy like twing he guitar vibe from From what’s the 90s like? Oh my gosh. opening with us on this one people you wouldn’t know. It no one knows this song. If there’s any die-hard humans out there who knows the song Stars and you’re like, yeah, I don’t know that shaped my life. Please. Let me know what I’ve been missing but The album cover is just a green background with a with a zebra. The album is called you’d prefer an astronaut. It like kind of reminds me of Modest Mouse sounding. Do you ever listen to Modest Mouse? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think they’re coming out with like a remake of their good news for people who love bad news album cool Cool. Yeah, this is a Modest Mouse probably comes has a lot of the same roots in the same musical movements as like bands like this, you know. The early 2000s emo comes out of the late 90s emo which you know, it’s it’s interesting to trace all that back. He just exactly right. Yeah. Yeah good times. Anyways, so. That’s something I’ve been listening to something. Well we talking about today. What are we talking about today? We got a couple things to talk about today. So it’s a little bit of a special episode because we are announcing that we’re going to actually make this the last episode. We’re going on a break for for a little bit of time. A few months a few months probably several months probably the next six months or so. Yeah, it’s not you. It’s us it’s not you it’s us we love you very much. Yes. Yes. I just need some time. To figure things out. Yeah, so I’ll let Maggie talk about Her yeah, I think she’s got going on. and we’ve come to a point in the in. Basically, we’re gonna Point our lives and our business lives, but the way business leads into the personal makes things complicated. Yeah, so we’ve probably discussed before and we’ll probably discuss in the future. We’ve fully intend to come back. but give him just where things are in each of Our Lives. We are still currently still excited about the the model of the podcast for now where we have you know, we’re talking about our own Realms our own topics of like our own niches if you will. Yeah, go back on back and forth on on that, you know each have A lot of passion around the things that we talked about. It’s just that those Realms in a lot of ways for each of us are kind of Shifting around in ways that it’s hard to get a hold of and hard to balance with. And hard to be exciting to talk about and hard to be excited to talk about. It’s a good way to put that to I think you are experiencing. Yeah a bit more of that. Maybe mostly your experiencing that because of the Fallen nature of real estate right now, but right um, but yeah, so that’s that’s that’s news that’s news and we yeah, we can say more we can say yeah, I’ll say more so I this is episode 41 and I I think today we were originally going to be talking about coffee and I wanted to talk and we still will yeah, we will we’re gonna get to this we want to kind of go out on this note, but we’re gonna talk about what makes a business successful. Yeah, right. That’s something that’s always a question its kind of ongoing. I’ve been thinking about that in terms of My business because I’m just always asking questions about what could be different or what are we missing or or what are we getting? Right and and there’s I think so much to what makes a business successful. So I was thinking about it just personally in terms of my coffee business, but I think it’s a general question that that either of us thinks about so we’ll Circle back around to yeah to that. Thank you for clarifying that because You know as we were prepping for today’s episode last week. About what makes a business successful? I you know, there’s there’s a lot that is Shifting and transitioning in the real estate world that I don’t feel qualified to speak about because It just everything is just changing so much. But if you hadn’t heard National Association of Realtors or Nar just settled in a lawsuit recently over Buyer agency commissions and it there’s again I’m not going to repeat the entire lawsuit and everything you can Google it. You Google Nar lawsuit verdict. Lots of places out there more qualified to educate you on on all of that and also you could you could just learn there’s just so many opinions and quite frankly all the opinions. The reason I’m not giving my opinion per se is because it’s adding noise to something that is not gone into effect yet and you like I’m the type of person that’s like until something is final. I don’t want to like It’s still shifting and changing and I don’t want to like add to that noise. So. But that being said the noise and the changes that are coming. are going to greatly affect how I do business in the future as a real estate agent and being in limbo In in one area of my life, I could probably handle but they’re like several other areas in my life where I’m also in limbo and it’s adding to that. anxiousness I should say and like there’s just not knowing what’s what’s going to happen in the future is just making it hard to talk about it and be excited about. real estate staging and all those things on a podcast where it was sort of born from our discussions about what’s going on and I know this is supposed to be unfiltered, but this is basically like What’s one step back from unfiltered? It’s like still roasting right now. You know what I mean? Yeah, I mean, yeah. Yeah, did I say something last week that I should touch on again? That might I’m not that I’m forgetting. Oh, you mean like when we chatted about all this yeah for recording or yeah. No, I I think I think what’s important to know is like we want to be able to have kind of real conversations about business ownership that’s always been. catharsis right part of the cathars is of doing this for us and I think you particularly for you. With all that’s going on. It’s like what we discussed was we’re not. there’s so much in flux and unknown and that it’s You’re not even always at Liberty to talk about certain things. So like the filter is kind of like automatically builds in around stuff. So. in a way that that makes it just stressful. So you try to think about let alone have a conversation around because right there’s there’s too many things like up in the air. Yeah around all consuming. Yeah. Yeah. So so a lot of why we need to step back from the Pod is just to let the dust settle on on things that are happening in in the career investment which again bleed over into the personal environments. So the whole work life balance thing. Is hard enough? without adding other stressors the pot not the podcast right adding without adding this the podcast which is kind of like Another job. It’s another workload. Yeah to a degree and not that we do that much. Like we’re not building a whole like infrastructures social media, like all this stuff around it, you know as much as we would want to but part of the reason we can’t invest more into it than we do already is because of how much other stuff goes on. Yeah, so and I also feel like I can’t put the effort into the podcast that I really want to and I’m not doing I’m not bringing Excellence. I feel like I am not bringing 100% into this podcast right now because of everything else going on and I want to I want to put 100% into this podcast and have You know. Be just be up to speed with our Instagram and be like putting things out there that are that people want to listen to and I don’t feel like I’m 100% And I I know that if it will come up across. that I’m not and I don’t want people to think that I don’t love doing this or I don’t love the pot or What we’ve build over these last 41 episodes It’s just that. like Rich that it’s not you it’s me, US whatever but yeah, so House Coffee podcast is something that rich and I both still really truly deeply care about and want to continue to pursue and create more episodes in the future just right now. We need to let the dust settle and focus on our businesses so that those parts of our life can still be successful so that we can come back and talk about them. Yeah, right. Yeah, I think so. We’ve proposed kind of taking like six months off coming back in the fall movie right and that from here feels like it’ll be a good amount of time to for those things to kind of get situated and us to have gone through things and like Take some lessons away in the meantime and just come back with those things a little more. Sustaining self-sustaining again and then and US knowing where we’re going like individually and professionally from there, you know, all the things. I haven’t talked a lot about things I have going on with with the business, but we’ve got a lot of ya puzzle pieces. We’re trying to fit together too for potential future. and by then I should know at least yeah as well kind of what’s What’s on the on the docket? And if not already moved into those those puzzle piece is being moved into place. So yeah, that that should hopefully give us a decent amount of time. So let things Scituate and then come back. Yeah energized. Yeah, totally. Ready to talk through this. Yeah, our team needs us. See teams your team. Yeah, yeah. So that said thank you for being along for the ride. Yeah with us. It’s been a lot of fun. And this isn’t goodbye. No, no. Yes, thanks for hanging on yeah. Thanks for hanging on. um we Can Circle back to yeah topic? Yeah, yeah, so I thought it was ironic that today. We were talking about what makes a business successful because we were talking about like what are the measures of success? How do our values fit into our business? our goals and ironically enough hitting pause on our podcast is one of those puzzle pieces for me at least that will fit into making my business welcome home Coco successful because like right now With all the changes that are happening in the real estate world, and there’s a lot of in the air for me. I need to make some decisions in terms of like what direction my business is going to go in and I have a staging business welcome home Co and that that business has started to like really take off and I want to focus a lot of my efforts on continuing to build. Welcome home Co in in such a way that aligns with the values that I talked about last episode. So. Some of those like measures of success whether it’s money or happiness time. those those are different for every person and every business but for me. I think the biggest measure of success in business is happiness. Peace and I for me. I was having a conversation with another agent at my office. Anthony and we were talking about all these changes coming up and I was saying like man life is too short life is too short to be unhappy and you know. again there’s there’s so much up in the air. that is is happening that like the things that I can control there’s a lot of things that I cannot control right now. I can’t I can’t control. You know the factors that are changing in my life, but I can control. the direction of my business and if I like double down and I focus on that then I know that. I will be happier. And so I want to I want to measure my success by. the happiness and the peace I feel at the end of the day when I’m going to sleep at night and You know, not only that. um with the changes that are happening At the market is still. Like when you compile that all the changes happening with commissions for agents and the shift in how we can advertise things. On top of all of that. It’s it’s still extremely narrow market for buyers. There’s nothing available. for sale and thankfully over the weekend. We finally had an offer accepted but like this I was I’ve been working with some clients who? Like again and again and again are offers had been rejected for not for financing reasons just because there’s just nothing available. We’re making offers against competing against people who are willing to waive their inspections or make all these other sacrifice their first born child all these things and things and it’s just it’s just been really stressful on top of everything else that has also added a level of stress for for me personally when I got into this business to help people and like and and part of that was helping people was helping them find their house helping them save money helping them get into a place that they love where they can make memories and I’m even struggling to do that because of like me and a lot of other people in my position. So thankfully we did finally get an offer accepted and we’re moving forward with that which I’m like relived about but yeah, I don’t mean I don’t mean to be ranting and raving because it’s not that’s not what my goal was with this. It’s just that well you’re gonna be able to but have more happiness. Yeah life. Exactly and I think to bring it around to how to when I asked the question. What makes a business successful? That’s that’s a little bit of a subjective. Question in the sense that it kind of a pets it kind of depends on what you mean by success. And there’s there are maybe some objective ways to define success, but for the the individual running a business, there’s there’s also necessarily those objective or I’m sorry those subjective. personal goals that make you feel or Or know you’re successful and for you. Those things have I think been threads in your business for a long time? helping people taking some of the load off of this this kind of difficult proposition of finding and buying a home helping them save money if she seems impossible in the current real estate market, right people are paying so much more than even asking price very often and and at other costs to themselves to potentially secure something they may be didn’t even like that much compared to write what they might have idealized. So all of that leads to a situation where you’re no longer able to like uphold your values or live by your values, which we’ve discussed and I have written as one of the measures of successes like or at least a question mark around how important is it to be true to your values as you define success in your business and we are the kinds of people who think it’s very important to be true to ourselves and what we value and why would we do things? totally understandable I think you know to be discouraged and what you’re doing when when all the forces are working against your values and there’s just nothing you can do to change that because while you’re physically located here the market is what it is. It’s it’s real estate. It’s great. That’s the whole definition of it. It’s not it’s physical. You know, it’s it’s a it’s it’s it’s where you as limited to buy where you are and then market conditions outside your control. Baseball says to me. So that’s what I took away from your quote unquote rants. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for summarizing. Yeah, we rich. Well, I think I think you’re touching on something really important. As I think about the ways to define success. Yeah. So happiness for you. Yeah, I think I think probably every I have to imagine business owner wants a degree of Happiness as a result of what they’re doing. You also touched on I put it in my own words, but you touched on like the ability to be self-directed. Yeah, or to be in control, right? You’re talking about all the things that you’re kind of out of your control. But the one thing that is in your control is the direction of your business. So so honing in on what you can control but that is a lot of people a measure of of success in their in their small business or like like self-employed situation is like I I choose that lifestyle because because I’m I want to be able to have the flexibility that comes with owning my own business. If I need to be closed I’ll be closed. If I you know, I can make my own hours to to whatever degree your career force or I can do this and not do this like it’s but it’s in my power. I think a lot of people get into business for themselves do so partly because they prefer to be in control or they need to be in control for better or worse or they they don’t like to when other people or you know, the can’t they don’t play well with others. They can’t really work for other people. Yeah, and So that that’s sense of control I think is also something that a lot of people maybe without even knowing or realizing. How important that is to them. I think that becomes a value and a measure success for for people again, so a degree it’s kind of subjective, but I think that’s something to touch on. I’ve always appreciated that. being a business owner at least like You know we get we get a degree of control around. Around what we’re doing and for better or worse if it goes, well, it’s on us right. That’s cool. If it goes poorly it’s also on us but you you know, you take the good of the bat. Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. I’m I’m just trying to adopt more of a mindset of like if why am I why am I doing something if it’s not making me happy? Not bringing me joy or peace. Yeah. that’s a that’s a very fair question to ask and and I would pose that to our listeners like There’s something in your life. That’s not making you happy like ask yourself like What what is what what about your life situation? Can you control can you change and that’s what I’m asking myself. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, this is a whole other conversation. We’re not going to have it now, but there is of course always something to be said for okay, sometimes there’s a degree of of slug faster on something. Yeah slog Fest. So you gotta you gotta But you deal with the measure through something because you love it. Yep, and you typically there’s there’s the sense that there’s gonna be a happiness at the end of it. Right? So there’s there’s a balance between okay, it’s worth this challenge to get to that spot where it’s gonna be. Fulfilling its hat is buying and and there’s there’s an obstacle ahead of like the success. But if a situation is just one where it’s untenable there’s no there’s no light at the end of the tunnel then then you that’s a different question. So that’s why yeah, say like There’s some reason for that but it’s you got to ask like is it ever gonna get there and eventually sometimes you just got to realize like no, it’s yeah, I’m call something. Yeah. Yeah, and kind of touching back on. the universe has your back being like you’re projecting. Your projection is your perception. um Yeah, I think that. that’s true in many cases, but also like If again, like I sound like a broken record, if something isn’t making you happy or bringing your joy. Why is it in your life? Okay, Marie. Kondo. Yeah, just kidding. That’s a trade-off that exactly that’s the right question to ask. Why is it in your life? And sometimes they’re going to be perfectly good answer I can stay in your life because there’s a justifiable reason right? We’re not saying that if it’s not bringing you happiness. It’s inherently bad. Yeah, that would be that would be leap. Yeah, I’d be hard argument to make right but I love the question. It’s like it’s it’s what is the bigger picture? Is there bigger picture on that thing? And if not then yeah. Yeah. Are we opened can we be open enough to like changing course changing something so that us and the people around us are all better for yeah, you know, so I am just focusing on what I can control right now and Helping the clients that are still with me still, you know slugging through this process too because they need a home or need to sell. So and I I also have to say I have worked with some of the most amazing people over the past couple years and like there’s no way I would still be in business if it weren’t for the amazing people that I work with like my clients, so They’re the ones who keep me coming back for more. Not all the BS that’s happening in the industry, right? You know, right? Yeah. That’s a good point, too. industry can be one thing but it’s like remembering the reason why we’re just service, you know that from the very beginning. But yeah, we’re service minor people we do it we do because Regardless of what’s going on what’s trending or what’s happening? Around us in our broader industry. They’re still the people at the heart of it that their happiness is our success like Yeah. And you know, not for nothing welcome home is not going anywhere. The whole point right is like you still have You still? Have a part of your business. That’s that’s really clearly. on a path toward flourishing and you’ve got a great team around that and this and help figuring out how to help them and serve them. Well as is a big part of your future sense of success and happiness, too. I’m actually yeah. Yeah, definitely said at some point last week. Well, we don’t think we recorded this. I think we were just talking about this but you had made a comment about you know, you’re only a successful as the people you surround yourself with. Yeah. And so, you know your whole you were saying your hope is to be able to really invest in your team. And I thought that was that was that was cool. That was cool to hear. That’s a good thought to have his like our success is business owners or organization leaders or whatever is is really tied to the people. that go with us that we that we are able to bring along and we serve them as we sort of lead them and You know our successes is then being sick so successful as well. Yeah. it’s a I think that’s what makes a good product. Yes. Yep, good business owner and good business good business in general if people can speak well of your of your people. You know that always has a lot about you and and your business. Yeah notice that Gary Vee talks about like you know when they’re when there’s a failure in the business like you have to look at as the business owner that’s on you. Because one way or the other. You are the owner of your business. And so if something falls through the cracks or something someone on your team does in doesn’t do something they’re supposed to do or fails. That’s something like that’s that’s on you. And yeah, I think that’s absolutely true. And so I I want to like keep that in mind that like I surrounding myself with people who are invested in welcome home call who wanted to be successful, but also like I want them to be successful too and I wouldn’t be where I am today without my team and same I’m I’m just so grateful for for them and happy that they’re sticking with me. Yeah. That’s a hard pill to swallow. But and I’m just because I know it’s true doesn’t mean I like do as much about it as I need to yeah, being an owner and a leader, but I know That’s that’s a truth. That is like objective truth. I I just I you know, yeah, I think that’s I think that principal Bears out. That’s what leadership is that’s leadership is what it comes down to you. Now, there can be again things out of your control as a leader that lead to your success or failure in in accounting for everything, you know, so they’re they’re can be things that surround the reason why something quote unquote failed as on your watch as leader, but Yeah, ultimately. it’s on you and all you can do from there is is Question what happened figured out and changing, you know grow it. Yeah. um Definitely some good principles here. a lot of what I was this question This question for me is is kind of really practical one. Honestly. I’m trying to figure out like because we’re in different Industries as yeah, we all know and we’re doing different things. We sell different things in different ways. You know, I own a I want to retail business. So I’m I have a physical location. I need people to come to yeah, discuss that and So given the model that I have, it’s It’s Tricky It’s Tricky and I look around at people with with similar models. The same basic concept or straw coffee shop. Sure. Yeah Cafe is coffee shops. I’m not talking about I wouldn’t consider as a restaurant where you’re coming in trying to get table services and stuff like that. So I am looking at like counter service. Yeah counter service cafe coffee shop, you know limited food menu possibly probably familiar Staples from place to place breakfast sandwich. Let’s sandwich but like pretty low-key Bagels maybe like coffee and coffee adjacent stuff tea smoothies, whatever there’s all kinds of stuff like that. bubble tea for us is as much a part of the mix as our espresso and coffee. In fact, we don’t even do smoothies and stuff like that because we’re bubble tea kind of stands in for for that menu segment. Well, let’s see shops exist. So that is a little bit of its own model and we have to do the work as story of kind of marrying a bubble tea called concept. And borrow from like the bolte culture, which is a whole thing. That’s it’s coffee adjacent, but it’s it’s really it’s own thing. Yeah, and then you have the coffee components. We have to kind of bring those together. So that makes us a little bit unique and poses some unique challenges and liabilities, but also also makes this, you know niche in a way that a lot of coffee shops. I’ve seen try to copy or do but but you not to the degree of success or a longevity that I’ve that we’ve experienced with it. Um, so I don’t know. These are the kinds of things. These are the kinds of things that I think about, you know, and that’s what makes me ask like what makes a business successful because because by and large, I think I think I asked a question like this. Maybe I’d ask it either way. But from my standpoint, I’m mostly asking it like why what makes us less successful. Quote because I’d have to Define that What Makes Us less busy? What makes us less popular what makes us less. Visited then other places that are similar to us in a similar area. That’s mostly how I’m approaching this this question. and I think a few of the things that we’ve touched on already do factor in. but then I do also think there’s just there’s a practical side to it that I end up thinking through and wondering what other people have to say on the matter. So like maybe I can Loosely outlined what I think Goes hand-in-hand because I ultimately I think the success of business again. It really does boil down here. I think it boils down to the right combination of things. if I was gonna put it succinctly without being specific I’d say it just you just end up with the right combination of things and I think Maybe topping that list would be would be. location I think it’s easy to understand. the value of a location You know, it’s not it’s not everything but it is. It is very important. Yeah. Because location is going to determine. its gonna help determine like your volume how busy you physically can be A physically how busy you physically might be it’s gonna determine how visible. And like how easy it is to get your name out there, right? You know how hard you have to push? In marketing versus just high visibility naturally things like that. You know in in some ways if you build the right thing you could build the right thing anywhere. And they’ll come you know, but I don’t think that’s a given I don’t think if you build it. They will come. I don’t think that’s true. It really depends on a lot of factors whether they’ll come or not if you build it, right, so that’s why I think location is is ends up being a huge. either asset or liability in my case. I think I have found that location has been mostly a liability. It’s been it’s been it’s been a struggle. to be located Where We Are in a couple different ways because you have where you’re located on your street. In your town in your city in your region, right? You can just go out from there. And and there’s there’s people who are who are gonna have more success. Then you in the same any one of those. Circles, right, you know? Depending on what what if you’re if they’re the same thing if they’re doing the same thing you are. They might have picked the better spot on the street better visibility. They might have picked. a busier spot in town or or regionally, they’re in a higher traffic or more densely populated area or whatever it is. So that’s that’s one factor. I think that’s that comes down to success its location, and I don’t know. I don’t know. Product what to say? Yeah, I think from there you go onto you go to you go to products and like you’re offering. This is where we’ve always felt pretty strong. that story in terms of our offerings and ultimately I think even more than like I do think we we struggle a little bit on the I don’t know if varieties that were but We have a kind of a limited offering but we what we have we do. We really well we try to do really well. Yeah. A lot of intention and focus onto that and really try to craft something that is is it’s designed. It’s a recipe like you go to a I’m not saying we’re five star or anything like that. But if you go to a restaurant and they have a course on the menu. If I were that and you order that we’re expecting the same thing, right? We’re both expecting. Like that to have come out. With it to like and have been prepared via recipe and if I go a week later, I want the same thing if they’re offering it blah like we expect that consistency. We expect also the intention around that recipe and we approach coffee and Bubble Tea in the exact same way. We’ve designed this drink. To be to be presented as we present it. Versus like don’t we’re not the kind of place where we invite you to just come in and and customize at all these syrups and change out this. This level of sweetness and this milk. It’s like no. No, we actually designed the tea to play with the that flavor. Look at you Maggie sugar in here. I know well and ultimately look there’s room for those preferences, but also anyone can just walk in and Trust like hey, if you get this drink at 100% sugar, which is a bubble tea culture kind of thing is like you can order less sugar you order by percentages. Well, we’ve we’ve actually just designed the strength to not be too sweet, but to have the right amount of sweetness to bring out like the T flavor in a way that’s that’s nice and and no sweet and no sweetness still brings out the teeth flavor because they’re sweetness in the bubble in the tapioca. Yeah. So then you have Room for everyone’s taste Southern formula with that, you know, yeah, there’s room for everyone takes but the point is like we have thought through every element of that drink. We’ve tasted that drink we’ve done everything we can to make that as good as it stands as it can be if you command you ask for a drink half sweet we’re gonna actually ask you like have you had our drinks before they’re actually not known for being that sweet. So I’m happy to do that for you because some people do prefer. I just really don’t like things sweet at all. We can do that. But ultimately you should also know like hey, we’ve actually thought about that for you already and our reputation is that these drinks are generally pretty good just as this and I often find people find that should be true when they when they trust to when they choose to trust us and and do that. And again, well, I was on their preferences and go with that but that’s our approach to products and I do think for us that’s a strength. That’s what we built a reputation on that. Does it lead to some sacrifices in other areas? Probably things that affect the success or business? Yeah, or maybe maybe that’s kind of the question. That’s why I’m asking these questions. Well makes a business successful. Into what degree? Can you can you balance like your the thing you truly want to bring with what people ultimately want to are willing to go for yeah. And again location can factor into that too because you don’t know. If you’re doing a real really Boutique kind of thing you but you do it in a place where there’s not a lot of. People who are looking for that then you might be doing the right thing in the wrong place. Yeah. You know, I heard Maxwell dashwood who I’ve talked about before from his book The Business specialty. I heard him on a podcast and he was talking about making this really Boutique Concept in London, I think. And he was like, yeah. We it’s a bit of an experience. And so we want to put it in a busy place where there’s going to be a lot more people who can and will go for that relative to like what we need to see come through the doors to make this business last so That’s that’s something I’m thinking about location location location location location as they say Yeah in real estate. I mean, but as not wrong it retail business, you’re not wrong. I Had an idea this morning that came to me. just sort of like I was just sitting there. I was like I have this idea. and I was thinking about with welcome home Co making like Not like a tagline, but like sort of like zeroing in on. My business and because you said something earlier that like triggered like a memory for me for me that says something you do. One thing really? Well, are you just specialty coffee or milk? Tea really well and like focus on that. and so this morning as I was Like reflecting and thinking about my business. I was thinking like what if I really honed in on stage and staging like older historic homes and like we still like or Vincent you because I use a lot of vintage stuff. And I was thinking about a house. I have coming up in Troy. It’s the it’s a single family three story building. with like like every bathroom has a claw foot tub. Like the four the floorboards are original like eight inches wide boards tall ceilings fireplaces and every floor just like Majestic. It just is this I’m so excited to Stage this house. and I was just thinking about like what would be the ideal house that I stage and it would be a house like that that’s like older has character. Not saying like the mega mansions aren’t fun, but it would. I’m not I’m just like spitballing here. I’ve just like ideas. Like you said that and like jogged a memory of mine and I’m like, oh whatever welcome home call like really focused on historic house is or older houses. Yeah, and but the question comes like it’s almost like how how much can you do that? Yeah. I don’t know how much how many of those are there know, how much do you have to spread yourself out to do that? Yeah. Yeah, it’s that’s interesting question. And that’s kind of question. How much can one afford to Niche down in the things that they’re really good at or or find the most enjoyment in or passionate about And and again, that’s that balance of well, how much demand is there for it? Does it seem to be for it? Maybe try and answer that question. You almost just can’t know until you try it. Just look for more opportunities like that. See where they lead. A little bit of a no substitute for time situation on that one. Unless you’re willing to say all right, my service area is 500 miles. yeah, nobody put yourself out there on a marketing front now, you know exactly so it’s kind of like that’s a lot of wear and tear on the trail trailer. Yeah. So that leads me to maybe maybe the biggest question I have to in this whole thing is something I I’m gonna go by way of observation. To the to the to the conversation, okay. I have observed that certain businesses, especially in the like food. or retail industry on the on this on the small like independent local business side of things. Sometimes the degree to which a particular business is successful. Is tied the degree is is like highly tied to the degree to which the owner is present. Yeah at all times in the business. So that is an important question to ask. because In other words, I’ve seen businesses that are highly successful because the owner is there managing every little thing taking care of every little detail. Sometimes they’re doing that by way of. accounting for every little detail training those things into a team of people and then they’re managing that team. Taking care of all those things or sometimes. They’re just Hands-On on all those little details. And no one else really knows. or is asked or taught to help account first so many of those little details and that makes the place really shine but it also we because No One’s Gonna care like an owner right about those little details, but also that’s obviously extremely limiting in taxing. depending on the situation and on the operation you can’t scale a business like that. For one you can’t grow you can’t have two locations. Because you only have one owner. So you can’t have two locations of equal quality, right? Without figuring out a way to transfer that unless you have somebody who loves the business as much as you do as their own. Yeah. Exactly. Right, right and that is What makes that a difficult proposition? but even then you can only scale to Which maybe that’s enough for you again? What’s your success? Do you only need one business to support you and your dreams and sustain your family through in your livelihood like On a limited basis, that’s fine. If that’s your definition of success. Yeah, that’s fine. Dude. I I like an Envision a world. I’ve been thinking about this. I’m not poised for this at any in any way at this point in my life, but I can Envision a world where riches coffee exists. And riches coffee is just me making coffee. and I’m the only person and I only need as much money as I need to pay rent. buy the coffee and then live but like I’m not paying people. We’re only open when I’m there. Yeah, it’s a small operation. I don’t need the insurance on the employees. I don’t need the payroll. So, you know what, I mean like and it’s rich as coffee. It’s just it’s me. and you get my full degree of like enthusiasm about people coming in and like service and the quality is going to be high as I can afford to make it and you know, all I have to worry about is me and you in that in that scenario when you come in for the coffee and it’s like and it’s not even called a story. That’s that’s rich is coffee. Yeah, that’s not a brand. I’m trying to build. I mean it becomes a brand but it’s not it’s not something else that needs to be bigger than one person like story does or some other concept would have to be that’s that’s me. That’s what I can invest richest coffee and it’s that’s the whole experience. That’s what you come for. You come from me but that’s by Design. I designed that’s all I want to do, but that’s not a lot. I wanted to Maggie. That’s not all what I want to do. I want the kind of businesses that run. with my input maybe my oversight. Definitely my help, but that are not tied to my physical presence. I am not passionate about that at all. At least not this stage of my life. I would like to see businesses that are self-sustaining. That I have helped design. and I’ve crafted but it’s its own products. The business is its own product and that’s where you start to get into like the like principles from the franchise model and repeatability and all this kind of stuff that goes into that. So so by way of observation, there are businesses family owned restaurants, whatever where when the owners present is going around. She’s going around every table check in. How’s the food? You know, I don’t know if you’ve been to places like this. Yeah, people always only sushi Okay, people always speak well of these kinds of places so that’s a credit to them. But again, it’s not what I want to do. I kind of want to be In the backgrounds, I’m happy to serve you if I’m working, you know, if I’m there just to be working. That’s cool. But I I don’t like the pressure of like I’m the owner sitting at the bar you come in and I have to be friendly to you even though I would like to be but I also like I would also like to do this work that I’m doing right here, you know. so so there is something I do think that can be a reason why a business is successful what makes business successful is the presence the care of the owner. But I I don’t think it’s a given. Also that might not be that leads to not success in some cases. And then also there are obviously successful businesses where the owner never steps foot. Or rarely yeah, you know any franchise model. I guarantee the founder of Dunkin Donuts has never been discussion to the store there. You know what I mean? I think for story though, you don’t like I hear what you’re saying about success and and wanting to be working on your business not in your business on the day-to-day whether to put that and it to me, it sounds like you need a clone. well Say more. I don’t know how much time we have left. Not much. I know you. but I think having someone I don’t think what you’re saying rich is that you don’t like talking to people you don’t like making coffee. You don’t like doing that’s not what you’re saying. Right? So the opposite of all that I know but I just don’t want people to like misinterpret like that. You literally said, it’s not that I don’t want to do this so I know okay. Thanks for having me but like they’re because there is that as a business owner there. Is that constant struggle of working on your business versus working in your business and it in order it’s hard to do both and you have to kind of like manage your time in order to do do the on your business stuff. But like on your business stuff also sometimes happens during business hours, which is when you’re in your business and people are coming and going and so my comment about the Clone is that finding someone who can take over one of those two things like take have a clone somebody who is just as passionate about Story Coffee and all those things you mentioned who can either Work on your business so you don’t have to or work in your business behind the counter so you don’t have to yeah, no no clone is actually a better idea because that’s a carbon copy of me. That’s just me doing both. Literally. That is actually what I need. I don’t know why I didn’t think that sooner you’re describing a manager or like a co-owner someone who write who takes full ownership of things. They can do the one or the other but the Clone I that’s genius right? This is the kind of Enterprise thing. Forward Thinking Stuff that we need this is great. Yeah. No problem. I I ultimately I agree what you’re saying. I think that the key to the owner not being the one working in the business as they’re trying to work on the business is to clone themselves by way of systematizing their brain, you know, I just saw an advertisement on a group on Instagram that was an animation of some of us sitting in front of the computer presumably the business owner and then is like little vacuum things come out. Up to them like and then sucks like their brain out and then it funnels it into like four different people and it’s it’s an advertisement for for a train you will which is like get the business out of your brain is kind of the whole concept that they had on that. and and so you you turn the one person into four people because or, you know, whatever that scale it right, but like you get what only exists in your head and what only you think to do on paper takes time takes work, but you get that out there and you then teach three people to do the same thing that only you have ever been doing in the way you expected done you account for okay, I you work through. What is that workflow? We’re kind of doing this right now in a story with the with the teams. We got a lot of new members, but we’ve also never really sat down and said, okay, how should our workflow go start to finish on any particular take it. and it’s such a process but once it’s done, it’s going to be a relief because now everyone’s gonna know what’s to do and how to work together and share space and The key to that is it doesn’t matter who’s pulling the levers, you know? The Power of Habit to me that’s a successful business is one that is so well designed is accounted for so many variables and and it removes the need for frankly for common sense common sense is not common anymore we find and so anytime you can design out a decision. I think you’re going to find success with working with a team. If you care about how things are done, you got to Define how they ought to be done, right? That goes back to the garyvee thing. We were saying before. If it goes wrong, it’s on you and if you didn’t think of it well now, you know, but if you don’t figure out how to put that into practice for everyone in every circumstance where that comes up. Then you’re going to you’re gonna have a repeat of that same problem. That that’s largely part. That’s part of how I’m how I’m like for me. I’d like to define success. So just combination. Yeah, that’s trying to figure out that combination because because in a low volume business that’s That’s limited by location potentially or limited by my ability to Market it right? In a low volume environment, I don’t have the money to bring in the people who are going to replace my presence, you know, so some some small businesses. They only work because the owner Is in the business quote unquote, um, unpaid labor, even though it’s a place that would cost money. So it’s not on it. It’s it’s a it’s a cost to the business to have even the owner there. It’s just that it’s a cost that it’s that that owner’s expense. Yeah, it’s make that call but it’s still not the greatest design. So that’s one of those limitations like this why I say it’s the right combination of things right combination of location that leads to visibility and and like volume backed up by your product that’s going to lead to repeat customers and all of that creates enough revenue and cash flow to where you can afford staff but still be profitable and then those staff are well trained in that fees the cycle and the and allows you to step out and then grow the business and work on the business in it. There you have it my blueprint for success. Love it. I guess it is more defined in my head. And I’m just trying to ask myself really more specifically. The question is like okay around here. Yeah, what do it where do I need to go? To find success because I actually think I know what the blueprint is. I just don’t know where to plug it in. Maybe you need to manifest or build it. I’ll pray about it. Well, Maggie. I’d say that’s a wrap for this half of season two. Yeah, yeah. Really appreciate you your perspective. I know that we’re gonna continue to see each other around. So yeah a lot about all these things and work through them together as friends. If you liked the podcast out there listening or land, please maybe rate and review it. Yes, not ultimately going anywhere. We’re coming back coming back in due time. We need to figure some stuff out. I need to figure some stuff out frankly. I think the positive me better than ever when we come back. I know well have some things right now. We’ll be settled I’m gonna have I’m gonna be running down so many episode ideas next people have a lot of journaling the crap out of my journal just like yeah. It’s like I’m actually looking for I think it’s a bigger break and I think it’ll be good. Reboot. I agree. Reboot 2.0. All right. Yeah. We love you. Love you. Thanks for hanging until next time later. See y’all around.