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Newsletter #246

Sunday, July 11

Hello everyone!  I've been back for a week now, so am counting the days until mid-December when I can go again.  Between now and then, there's a lot to consider and a lot to be done to insure the continued survival of the business.  Don't misunderstand; I am in no danger of going belly-up, it is just that I believe it is a mistake to get too confident when things are going at least reasonably well.  I am a big believer in always waiting for the other shoe to drop; it keeps me sharp. 

BlingBling Plaza (Jewelry News)
As it turns out, I did find another source for the gemstone cabinet that I require in order to move ahead with my current pile of stones and pearls languishing in a box on my desk.  I am a bit more confident that it will arrive this week, so I have gone ahead and begun the process of photographing.  In order to keep everything straight in these less than optimal conditions, I have just put each item in a tiny plastic zipper bag and put the info for each one on a round white sticker on the outside of the bag.  When the new cabinet arrives with all those little gem jars inside, I will simply transfer both sticker and item to the jar.  With that in mind, I photographed the Sapphires yesterday and will be loading those pictures and descriptions to the website later today.  You will find those here when I've sent out the newsletter and made the necessary alterations to the website.  I think there are a dozen Sapphires to be added. 

If time permits, I will use the same method to keep track of information for the South Seas Pearls that are awaiting their turn to dazzle you with their beauty.  If all goes well today, I will have pictures of at least some of them done and they will appear here.  I also have another Kasumiga Pearl to photograph; it will appear here when it is ready, then I have some Confetti Quartz (also known as Confetti Sunstone) to photograph and I think I will display that on the Loose Topaz & Quartz page since that's where I put the last ones. 

Kimono News
I've only just today realized that I haven't added the three most recently acquired Happis to the website, so I will take care of that ASAP, and you should see those either later today or sometime tomorrow.  Have a look at the page tomorrow for the fresh ones.  Of course, the next package is currently under construction; at this moment, I'm not sure what is in it, but I do know that I have to have Kiro concentrate on Men's garments and also on Happis, Hantens and the Kasuri cottons as I have so few of those items just now.  There are definitely two jubans for men and several haoris in the current group being put together, but other than that I will be as surprised as you will be when the parcel is received. 


Other News
One of the things to consider as a potential cornerstone of my business is the Coffee and Rooibos Tea venue.  The new owners of the coffee shop a block down the street have opened with their selection of coffees and used books.  Love the idea of the books; I read almost as voraciously as I watch DVDs, so now there is a place that will buy my book discards.  I was selling them in my own shop, but since the new shop asks twice my price, it is in their best interests to buy mine so that customers going around the square don't make note of the difference. 

However, the coffee part of their venue seems to be another thing altogether; facts are currently sketchy as details come to me in bits and pieces, but customers are telling me that the coffee when consumed in its pure black form without the cream and sugar enhancements tastes burned.  The most usual comment is 'not as bad as Starbuck's, but definitely burned.'  I am of the opinion that this is not the fault of the owners, but the fault of their supplier, since this shop does not roast its own coffee.  I have had one of the foo-foo coffees from there (caramel macchiato) and it tasted the same as that particular coffee purchased from any location.  I choose that one on purpose because since it is so very sweet, it is difficult to get one that is undrinkable.  I'm also being told that their coffee is brought in already ground and already sectioned out into parcels; I'm going to check on that because I did not see any jars of whole bean coffee on display and I don't want to be speaking out of turn by assuming that they are not selling bulk whole bean. 

With the closing of the shop by the previous owner, my coffee sales increased by a small margin and with the reopening of the shop by different (and MUCH more personable) people, I would have expected my coffee sales to fall off, but this is not the case.  The reopening of the coffee shop has not affected my coffee sales in any way and this was surprising to me before I started hearing the 'burned coffee' comments; now it makes a bunch more sense.  Sometimes I think that having a business pivoting on only one point is not as stable as one such as mine, which has numerous venues.  The argument would be that if a business is based only on coffee (the books are space filler as much as anything else, since the location is a sizable one) that the coffee served/sold would be extremely good, since the business owners would be able to pick and choose from various roasters until they found the best of the best.  For whatever reason, that doesn't appear to be the case; perhaps because the husband also has another business completely separate from this one and the wife works a full-time job at one of those big convenience store/truck stops.  After examining the various swatches of information, I'm betting that she found a way to buy coffee for her shop from the same people that the C-store is buying from.  Obviously that would be the simplest way to acquire a supplier; no searching or researching, just the plug-and-play convenience of being able to buy from the first source with which you have contact by way of your employment.  Almost everyone has had coffee from a C-store at one time or another and rarely does that coffee evoke rave reviews from demanding coffee drinkers such as myself, so without any evidence to the contrary, I'm sticking to my theory for at least the near future. 

Almost any retail venue is cyclic, often without any reliable pattern to the various peaks and valleys.  When you have only one essential product to offer, you do well during the peaks but suffer with equal intensity during the valleys.  For me, the coffee business may be up or down at a given time, but I have the gemstones, the fine jewelry, the vintage Japanese garments and the antiques to level things out for each other whenever one or another venue suffers from its cyclic depressions.  At the same time, I have to say that I have as many venues as I can comfortably handle with any efficiency and that is only because James is 99% responsible for the acquiring of antique merchandise for the shop; he finds it, buys it, cleans/repairs it if necessary, prices it and puts it out on the sales floor.  If I had to deal with that part of the shop, I would have to discontinue at least one other venue and I'm simply not willing to do that; but I do make it a practice to stay with the venues I know and use myself so that I can at least be sure that I am offering the very best possible in each of them to my very valued clients. 

That's it for now; thanks for reading and happy shopping!
Angie