Blast From the Past Two!

My first business card . . .  the one that got me in trouble at the gift show with its tag line . . . and note the emergency stamped address - this was because the previous tenant - the infamous Frank Fox - refused to vacate the premises on May 1st so I couldn't get in.  My own calligraphy - and at the time - I thought the card sophisticated!

Our first advertisements - 30 Years Ago ! ! !

So . ..  looking through some old folders, looking for I don't even remember what, I found a few advertisements that I made for the store the first years we opened.  It was well before the days of computers making images and design  a little easier  - and the rubber-stamps we sold and my calligraphy pen came in very handy.  Actually, I think the one above might have used a very early computer to print out the type?  But the bottom is from the very first year or two.  They look so impossibly quaint and old fashioned to me now, but I was proud of them then.  Guess that's the way things go - or the way they evolve.  I remember a friend who was a puppet maker - I had bought a puppet from her the first year she was in business and several years later she visited and was quite distraught to see her early effort.  She really really wanted to take it away and replace it with a new one, but I wouldn't let her - I was very fond of that early puppet.  And I guess I kind of feel the same about these early ads - they're not what i would do now (see last ad for comparison) but - I still like them!  

Joie a la Kafka

At the end of every day we close out our charge machine and Eleavon, our processor, then sends the money to our bank.  The settling process is very easy - you punch in "settle" - it gives you the amount in the machine;  you say "yes" for correct and it's on its way.  It's the simplest system we've used in thirty years and we have had it for about five years with not a single problem.  Until last night.  The machine gave me the total as usual - and when I hit "yes" it hesitated, then said it did not agree.  I recounted the slips - the total was correct.  I tried it again a few times as I'm optimistic that way but always got the same message. I then called their customer service line, anticipating an easy resolution.  An hour and a half  - an hour and a half - later, I hung up, after talking my way through various increasingly high level supervisors who could not tell me why they had no record of a $300 charge on their end.  I pointed out (many times) that they had given me an authorization number for that amount and that I had the slip to prove it.  At one point someone said "an authorization number is not a guarentee that a sale will go through."  And sadly, at that point, I did use just one curse word to inquire why the F we bothered to authorize anything in that case.  At the end of the hour and a half they were admitting  that this "virtually never" happens and agreeing to credit us the amount we were due.  And I left the store with a little less sanity than I had when I entered that morning.  Though I don't think I'm permanently damaged, it was a truly strange experience !!

Which item has been on display?

We realize this is a difficult question - but we think you'll be able to figure it out !  These are our "Brawny Brawlers - you smush them together and as they slowly unstick, they look eerily alive - like they're in a serious wrestling match "for reals".  We find them kind of mesmerizing and impossible to stop playing with, hence the need to occasionally break out a new display - eventually they will lose the stickiness that makes them so alluring.
Plus, they sort of change race.  Anyway, we found the difference rather striking and wanted to share!

My New Favorite Card

I'm kind of in love with a birthday card.  It's an unassuming little card, no glitter, not flashy, but it has completely won my heart.  I ordered it from a new company at the Stationary Show - we got a dozen different styles of cards from them, and this one just gets me.  It's exterior has a small drawing of the world, and the wording "If you could have ANYTHING in the world for your birthday, what would it be?"  Of course, you think for a moment before you open it.   Then you open it up and inside it simply says "Please say a card, please say a card . . ."   I don't know why it strikes me so funny but everytime I walk by the birthday card rack and see it sitting there, I both have to smile, and I feel a wave of an almost weird protectiveness towards the earnest little card. I want those who open it to think yes - this is the best possible thing, this very card!  Is this a sign that I've been in this business too long?  Anthropomorphizing birthday cards?   I don't know - but I do know I didn't order enough of them.  I'll be wanting to send them to everyone I know - or everyone I know who doesn't regularly read this blog. And so far, just this morning we've sold a few too, so I'm not alone.  Please say a card, please say a card, please say a card!  And in other exciting news - though I doubt any of them will get their own blog entry, I found quite a few good new cards at the Show.

Another Sign of Changing Times

I looked at our increasingly lonely answering machine this morning - we get messages so infrequently, we sometimes forget to check.  It was blinking! A message! I started to listen - and it was a human not a robot! A personal call from one of the directors of the National Stationary Show in New York - a show I have faithfully attended for years. "Thank you so much for coming to the show, we are looking forward to seeing you" went the message. I sighed. What it said to me in a nutshell - we have so few buyers registered for this show that we are actually calling them all on the phone - just to kind of remind them they signed up. That about sums up what's going on with this show - it's been getting smaller and smaller every year. Almost none of the larger card companies I buy from have exhibited for years now. It used to be exciting and fun -  but then - the post office also used to be a relatively thriving business. Things have changed. And there are so many less independent stores, the former backbone of this industry. Stores that buy cards "by the foot" like Barnes and Noble or CVS don't need to come and choose cards - they just take what they're given. But the good news: there is a silver lining to this cloud - there are many more very cool tiny little companies exhibiting now - and I have yet to attend the show without finding something for Joie de Vivre that we love!

postscript: Another friend in the biz just told me she has received several of these calls and thinks that they were, in fact, made by robocall - real voice, just not a real person spending their time calling - and - frankly, I don't know if that's better or worse!

Man versus Machine

(I really should have said "person vs machine" but it doesn't have quite the same resonance.) I was working alone  today - and at one point there was a mother and daughter in the store - just them and me. We had exchanged hellos and they'd looked around a bit - after maybe ten minutes they were both standing near the front desk,  working their cell phones.  To try to get attention back to the here and now, I said "like mother, like daughter!"  They did look up - and the daughter said to me, "I'm trying to find where the next place we're going is."  I asked the name of the place - thinking it was probably off in another town - and she said "Ward Map."  (which is two and a half blocks from us.)  And it just struck me how much things have changed - they didn't even think to ask me if I knew where it was. (of course I told them.) - but - I guess the new normal is - why talk to someone if you can consult your phone?  Of course maybe they were being considerate and thinking they wouldn't bother me but I don't really think so.  They were just more focused on those phones than they were on where they were and the person right in front of them - and, that makes me feel just a bit superfluous - and a little bit sad. I wasn't busy, and I was right in from to them. And,  I like to think I would be nicer to engage with than a cell phone.  Actually, I doubt it was any kind of a conscious choice on their part- and they were happy when I was able to tell them how close they were.  I feel like I did a good thing by getting them into a conversation.  But the implications are troubling to me.  I like talking to people, it's a big part of why I do what I do.  I don't want to be replaced by a phone!

Thinking About Thirty

Since our 30th anniversary is approaching, we've been thinking a lot about the last thirty years.  What's changed, what hasn't.  The people who have passed through the life of Joie de Vivre - all the customers, the staff, our suppliers, and those we see every day like the UPS man (with a very occasional UPS woman) and the Postman - (so far, 30 years of guys).  The Joie blogger is planning to write some about this both in the blog, and also a lengthier piece which maybe we'll present at the 30th fete.  But for right now, just a recent thought on the U.S. Mail.  Being a mailman used to be kind of a wonderful job.  People were always excited to see the you.  You might be delivering  a letter from a long lost friend, a check, a postcard from abroad, a love note, the long awaited Spring Sears catalogue; the mail was exciting.  Now mailmen must trudge around carrying mostly unwanted junk mail, newspaper coupons, and the occasional bill and birthday card (usually mailed by someone who grew up when people still wrote on paper.) Even those of us who still open our mail with the tiniest thought that there might be something personal know that it's a rather long shot.  (& we are the ones who still think a ringing phone during the day might be someone we know and not a solicitor or a machine!) I don't think too many people think of the mail delivery with excitement anymore and can't help but wonder how that affects the morale of our mail"persons."  That's one big change we've seen in the last thirty years for sure.

Slightly Disillusioned

Just a short post to say we just received an email from one of our smaller vendors.  It said "I'm organzing my twitter campaign for May and am planning to tweet on May 27th about (item we carry.)"   She wrote because they are planning to link the item to our website -  which is very nice of them, and free publicity is always fine with us.  But - twitter "campaign"?  Mapped out a month in advance?  Maybe it's silly of us, but we always thought Twitter was supposed to be one of the more spontaneous of the social media platforms.  (I know - so old school). Guess that kind of creative and fun randomness doesn't last long - but just wanted to register our small pang of disappointment - it makes Twitter seem like everything else, just another tool in the marketing kit.  Which brings us to the thought - when it's so easy to constantly market market market through the internet - it can backfire and the result is few people pay attention.  I read recently that the number of ad clicks on websites has decreased by 40% in the last five years.  All interesting - and wonder where we are headed with all this . . .

Faith in Humanity Affirmed? Check!

We decided to decorate our little front garden last weekend for Easter - adding some Easter ducks and some clip on chicks (on the pussy willow branches.)  We did it with a bit of trepidation, wondering if the little display would last.  It certainly wouldn't be a big loss financially if someone had taken these items - the total cost was well under $10 - but it would have been a spiritual loss of sorts.  (Okay, we will qualify that - a fairly minor one as spiritual losses go.)  Anyway, it made us very happy to come in every morning and see that our chicks and ducks were all in a row.  Except the ones on the pussy willows, which were not in a row, but present and accounted for.  Thank you honorable people of Cambridge!

Return of the Prodigal Bun(ny)

You see above a customer holding two bic pens with knit rabbit pen toppers.  The one with the small green dinosaur ring around its neck just returned to Joie de Vivre after a mysterious and up to now inexplicable disappearance. We get very attached to small things at Joie.  Previously, we used little devil duckie pen toppers; we were selling them, they were cute, and not incidentally, having pen toppers is an excellent way to keep one person in particular (okay - it's me) from chewing away the tops of all the pens - a bad habit I developed in my youth.  The little devil duck toppers were discontinued awhile ago and slowly all of ours disappeared.  As anyone with any life experience knows, pens do disappear, along with socks and keys and . .  anyway, we started out with three rabbits and one went missing long ago.  Just after Christmas this year we realized we were down to one.  After a week or two, we resigned ourselves to its loss.  Several months later, last Friday night, to be exact, I was invited to a Trivia night to benefit the Arlington Children's Theatre.  I would be sitting at a table with among others, four people who work very part time here during the crazy holiday season. (those among you with detective skills are doubtless saying aha!)  When we were paying our share for the table, one person took out her checkbook - and the pen on the left.  I snatched it out of her hand instantly.  She laughed.  "I've been meaning to bring this back for the longest time," she told me.  It may sound ridiculous, but when I texted this photo to the two current Joie de Vivre employees - I don't think it would be an exaggeration to say they were thrilled. (employees, correct me if I'm wrong.)  So, the lost bunny story has a happy ending, and we will try to keep a better eye on our pens, at least for awhile.

Unclear on the Concept - or - We Love Packaging !

  We are always on the hunt for squirrel items, as we love squirrels and so do many of our customers and while at the  Gift Show a few months ago, we were taken with these "jungle bookmarks."  Of course the juxtaposition of jungle and squirrel was quite the added plus as we are always on the hunt for the silly as well.  (the other two in the series were gorillas - okay - and hummingbirds - maybe remotely possible in a jungle.)  One of our witty customers suggested perhaps this was a sophisticated reference to the concrete jungle and we had to agree it made a kind of sense.  Today, I was sitting at my desk when I heard a muffled snort from the next room where someone was unpacking an order of very cute "wildlife" items.  Okay . . .  dogs can be kind of wild, especially when you're throwing them sticks or you let them off their leash, but I've always thought of them as really the epitome of the domesticated creature.  We hope we'll find more to add to the incongruous collection!