Creative Reasoning

I've been working on this idea nearly nonstop for the last month, and it's getting close to launch! It has come with a lot more pressure than I expected, and the physical labor really adds up when you're not splitting it with anyone else. But that's not what I came here to talk about! I have answers for the curious, information for the observant, and an outlet to share how I came to some of the conclusions behind my approach. This is going to be a bit of a yarn *full of stories* so settle in for a long read. Let me pick a place to start, and I'll tell you what I saw and got out of it.

I had just moved to Bowling Green to start a new life, my own businesses, and be with my family. The job I had lined up fell through, and after struggling for more than a month, I took a job at a fast food pizza chain as a manager in training. A couple of weeks later, the pandemic broke out and everything changed.

The corporate response was immediate and thorough. The place I worked did not hesitate to rapidly start phasing in protections and countermeasures, even when the staff were resistant to the changes. After all, the company was changing how things were done from the ground up, and it added a lot more extra work for the little guys, i.e. us.

I wanted to work somewhere corporate to begin with, and this became a good example of why I made that choice. I had been doing the local independent thing for years now, working directly with owners and picking their brains. But if you want to get better at chess, play better players- or at least bigger ones. The chance to study one of the bests in the industry from the inside was worth more to me than just the paycheck.

I had a front row seat not only to the adaptations they were making, but the reasoning behind them. I got to watch a corporate giant cope, adapt, and thrive while others were temporarily closed or even outright folded. 

There was always a maximum effort to contain the spread. Measures were put in place to protect people- employees and customers both. Being a food delivery business meant the employees would be deemed essential workers, so we wouldn't be closing or staying home. We would be booming.

By taking measures quickly and adapting early, the company I worked for was pulling record numbers while its competitors were still dragging their feet, slashing their hours, or temporarily closing. The changes we had already rolled out became selling points that showed up in our marketing and advertising.

When the dust settled and businesses began reopening, the company came away with a big win. After the industry wide spike in revenue, most of our competitors settled back into normal figures. The corporatation I worked for had managed to hang on to some of the extra market share and plateau at a company wide increase close to 20%

If you're already a delivery company, it's not too much of a stretch to adapt into contactless commerce. People have been paying over the phone and through apps for years now, and delivery is no new breakthrough. Combining the two with social distancing was a snap at the corporate level, and the payoff for being able to adapt and publicize early was massive.

It was so different at places outside of my job. And scary! Everything was adapting. Everywhere you went, there were new rules and changes to how transactions were facilitated. Not every business had the luxury of just installing some tweaks, the ones that could even be open needed to make physical changes to their brick and mortar stores, even if it was just a piece of plexiglass at the register.

I had seen firsthand what could happen if your business adapted well. The constant news of closings and bankruptcies had shown me what happened if you couldn't.

I have been talking about my dreams for years. If you've never heard any of my ideas for starting a business, it's likely we've never had a conversation of any length. It's what I left the small town I adored living in to accomplish. It felt like my legs were cut from under me when the pandemic broke out. Starting a business at a time like this? I just couldn't see a way. Even if I started something mobile, where would I set it up? There were no bar crowds to sell munchies to, no big events to cater for, and no place to insert myself where people gather. I was sunk before I even began.

It kept nagging me though. I couldn't just stop wanting to start something even though I had pretty much talked myself into giving up, at least until things calmed down. It just seemed like I was missing key information that would clear things up for me, and I wasn't going to find the answer in a vacuum. 

That's when I set off on the fact finding mission I mentioned in my Prologue post where I said that I would tell you more about it. It's a long story, but this is the post I have set aside for long stories, so here we go!

It was easy to play the part of a tourist when that's exactly what I was. I explored the cities I always wanted to visit, by myself and at my own pace. I took pictures of famous landmarks, walked through gorgeous parks, and always kept my eyes open. How had businesses adapted in denser locations? What was the public response? I had been cooped up at home for months, like a lot of people. How was where I came from any different than where I was going?

There's no easy answer. Chicago, Washington DC, New York City, Savannah. Everywhere I went, there were similarities. Advertisements everywhere explained how [brand name] was working to keep you safe. How [brand name] was making things more convenient 'in these trying times.' 

I saw hundreds of ways companies had applied solutions to pandemic problems, but it all felt so clunky. I figured that of all of the millions of business owners out there, I was going to run across a place that had figured out the clever solution that hadn't caught on yet. But it just seemed like there was no smooth way to change, only to compromise. Outdoor seating, partitions, heated patios, order ahead apps- all forms of precaution you could think of were out there. I saw some some trends and well executed ideas, but the over all experience was muted across the board. It just wasn't the same, and everyone knew it.

It didn't clear up anything for me. I wandered the sidewalks, subways, and beaches, trying to understand how we could all be so sunk. I couldn't find the clarity I was looking for, and there were no good answers out there. We really were all in this together.

It didn't stop me from having an incredible time. I very much enjoyed my travels, but my early results were disappointing. 

I took a few days to recharge in Savannah. Got a tan in the southern sun, visited family, and relaxed for a while. I hung up my fact finding for a bit and enjoyed myself. That's when I met Ella online.

We had tons of things in common and talked at length about our passions over text. For me, it came back to my startup. For her, it was spearheading the local chapter of an organization called Food Not Bombs. The way she explained it to me, they gathered excess food from multiple sources and used the ingredients to provide free meals for anyone and everyone in a public sharing.

I was fascinated. What a positive way to break away from the establishment. A caring and supportive way to reject the status quo and make a difference. I had to see it for myself, I love kitchens and serving. And I've always had a weakness for interesting new ideas so inevitably, I volunteered to help cook.

Cut to me chopping garlic and carrots in her kitchen while she filled me in on the particulars of what she does and how she accomplishes it. I hung on every word, the whole concept had a flair I couldn't resist. It was more than just a cause she volunteered for, it was the fabric of her lifestyle.

We gave away food in the park well past sundown. We talked to people, helped them where we could, and used an outside the box philosophy to do something positive.

For Ella, that was everything. Making a difference, taking care of people, and making an impact. She was serious about making her slice of the world a better place, I could see it on her face as she figured up how many servings she had given out. She was counting the left over forks, not a cash register, to measure her success. 

It wasn't unti well after my trip that I started to put it all together and realize that I had found the beginnings of my own answers and had such a genuine good time that day. I had finally found something that was truly being done differently. It was a force for good, in the name of caring and positivity. Everything I wanted my startup to be capable of, and she was out there living it every day.

Food Not Bombs was founded in the 80's, it's not exactly a new idea or the only organization like it. But watching Ella count those forks had given me a new way to examine my own variables and the way I was thinking about them.

She had taken the cash register out of the equation, and that was the thing I admired the most. Without that, the social contract of exchange was broken, and magical things were possible. A sale could become a gift, and what would normally become a transaction could become an experience. Isn't that what I wanted to begin with? 

We use transactions to acquire experiences, and it is the transaction that is in the way. Even the big corporations are stumbling over it these days. Remember that pizza place I worked at? There are some markets where nearly all of the customers in their area order and pay for their deliveries online. This is absolutely the best case scenario for their business model during the pandemic. But for the markets where most people still prefer to call in and carry out, the devil is in the details and things get clunky again. 

This is just one example. It doesn't take much for the choke point of finalizing the transaction to diminish a buying experience. Poor customer service, substandard products, and unexpected expenses can put a damper on the excitement of any purchase. When you agree to pay for something, the other party agrees to meet your expectations to a clearly defined extent. By getting the cash register out of the way, two things happen. You opt out of the social agreement of mutual expectation, and you completely remove the choke point between experience and enjoyment.

Eureka. I had just discovered the way forward. 

What if I didn't sell anything? 

Making sales was never something I aspired to do, it just always seemed to be a part of the job. It is the definition of what a business is supposed to be in the first place. I would have to make sales to recover my costs, and even more sales to make a profit, and eventually it would enable me to restock, make more sales, and eventually more profit. It's a loop I never wanted to get stuck in.

How many cups of it would I have to sell to turn a profit? Probably thousands. I would love to make thousands of cups of coffee for thousands of people, but I would have to find a way to sell it to them first. I would have to make my product available, make my market aware of it, and then facilitate the transaction.

The only thing on that list that I actually care about doing is making coffee. I love the stuff, and everything that goes into it. It is an incredible subject that never runs out of interesting source material. I could try my whole life and never learn everything there is to know about coffee. Or the people who love it. Those are the things I actually care about and want to do. This is the way I think I can do it.