Brooks Powell 🍻’s Post

How carefully, and often, are you measuring (and optimizing) your cash conversion cycle?

Dare to try again with seasonal sales? Indeed the first attempt proved us wrong from the sales/revenue/margin point of view, but it did drag attention and public to the boutique. And that is important. Why trying again? There could be many reasons or, to put it in a different way, justifications. One is simple: reduction of old stocks. This is not a hotel selling a fixed amount of products (rooms) per day and losing the sale by the time the night auditor presses the end-of-day button. Commerce gives you the opportunity to sell again that item you could not sell yesterday. And that's where we are now. We try again, this time with a different approach. On first day, with just one order we sold out 21 valuable products. The question remains on how we will return to normal prices if we could not end our stock. That will be another lesson. In any case, new collections are waiting in the pipeline, so better move on. The joy of being on this entrepreneurial venture is to be learning every single day, trying and trying.

In bidding farewell to 2023, I can't help but to think of what a strange and difficult year it has been within the world of retail. Business is never easy -- if it was, everyone would be doing it. But this past year was uniquely difficult with a confluence of so many factors making the business environment that much more challenging for so many. This article from The Robin Report summarizes the "year that was" in retail... and it wasn't pretty: https://lnkd.in/eeFqvAKb My quick take: As strong as retail was for so many during the pandemic, it was just the opposite on the other side of the pandemic. Heavy inventory positions sank retailers and those that supply retailers with products. For retail suppliers like us, not only did we have our own heavy inventory issues to sort through, but replenishment orders from retailers were incredibly soft as they had their own inventory issues to work down as well. A double-whammy. What's important is that we are here. Many aren't. As Whitmor enters our 78th year of business, we continue to learn and become smarter and more efficient in everything we do. I am so proud of the resilience of our company and our people. Focusing on what you CAN control vs what you CAN'T control is where I am placing my focus in 2024 and beyond, and you should too. Happy New Year to everyone reading this, and please reach out if I can ever be helpful.

Did your business take a knock during the pandemic? Well, that is exactly what happened to Gail… She unfortunately had to shut down ALL her businesses 🙈 But, within as little as a few weeks Gail was able to build an online store which allowed her to start trading again 🤩 Not only was having an eCommerce store a lifeline that kept her business afloat… But it also created a totally NEW revenue stream that she could benefit from long into the future! P.S. If you’d like to check out even MORE inspiring stories of how eCommerce has transformed people’s lives, then click the link below to be inspired 😉 👉 https://bit.ly/2TFLByS

Imagine sitting with your team, brainstorming on how to elevate your company to the next level. What if someone suddenly suggests, "Let's drop discount coupons from a helicopter"? You'd probably laugh it off as a joke, right? 🤣 Well, that's not how the founders of STAGE reacted! During my tenure at STAGE, which was fully remote at that time, I first met the team in person at an offsite meeting, four months after joining. We were enjoying breakfast when the conversation shifted to boosting our subscriber base. In a playful mood, I blurted out, “Let’s make it rain discount coupons from the sky—like in Money Heist!” I had just finished the latest season the night before and meant it entirely as a joke. To my surprise, the room paused. "Wait... what?" they said. I clarified, grinning, "Yeah, let's get a helicopter and shower the town with coupon codes! 😎" What I thought was a lighthearted joke led to founders Vinay Singhal and Shashank Vaishnav seriously discussing contacts who owned helicopters, cleanup logistics, and necessary government permissions. Now it was my turn to be shocked. "Wait... what? 😨" (Seriously, who does that? ) To cap it off, Vinay Singhal, Shashank Vaishnav, and Parveen Singhal handed me a ₹1000 Amazon voucher as a reward for my 'idea'—my joke had suddenly turned into a serious idea! This experience showcases the unique culture at STAGE, which I was lucky to be a part of early in my career. Setting the helicopter idea aside, think of this from a business owner's perspective: What can you do to ensure that you build a team of not only DOers but also THINKers? Here, I learned that it's not just about doing; it's about thinking creatively and boldly. That's what elevates a company from zero to one! Years have passed since I left STAGE, and they have grown tremendously. The ethos of nurturing a team that is both proactive and visionary has stayed with me, shaping how I am building my own company's team. P.S: Check out the amazing review Vinay left for the guy who wanted to pull off a Money Heist in the skies of Haryana!

I once got a midnight call that almost destroyed our startup... It was the early days of our company Toast POS where every customer we got felt like a hard won battle. It was New Year's Eve, and I was out at a party, celebrating the close of a long year, when my phone rang. It was our CEO. Our system had gone down at a new customer location, a popular nightclub. They couldn't take credit card payments, and the line for the bar was growing angrier by the second. I grabbed an Uber without a second thought. As I arrived, I could see the place was packed to the walls, but chaos was brewing. Customers were frustrated, the staff were overwhelmed, and the bar couldn't keep up with the demand. I knew this would reflect poorly on us - on Toast. We were still in our early days, and a critical point failure at a moment like this could wreck our reputation. I got to work. I pushed through the crowd, squeezed my way behind the bar, began troubleshooting, testing connections, restarting the system, etc. There wasn't a dedicated support team to call on for backup - our support line rang me, our CEO, our COO, and our head of product. I remember the frenzied, fast-paced feeling of it all. I was stressed, afraid of what might happen, but moving quickly and trying everything I could think of that might help get credit card payments back online. After what felt like an hour, but was probably only minutes, I tried running my credit card again... ...and it worked. Payments were online. The staff jumped into action and began swiping cards left and right, getting drink orders moving again. The club roared back to life again. While that customer experienced a problem with our product, we showed them we were committed to their success, and they not only continued working with us - but also recommended us to other customers. We made it through that night, and it was a moment that defined not just the resilience of Toast, but also our commitment to never leaving our customers in the lurch - no matter when or where a challenge might arise. This is the kind of fight and commitment it takes to build something great. #entrepreneur

🚀 Big news in the Shopify universe! Loop x Wonderment 🤝 With Wonderment’s proactive CX + advanced tracking. And Loop’s returns management, Shopify merchants can now: ✅ Retain more revenue ✅ Reduce friction ✅ Build unshakable customer loyalty Simplifying commerce-- that’s a win-win. Stoked for this new chapter! Ready to level up your post-purchase game? My DMs are open 🤠

Exciting news from the team at Loop! 🎉 Learn more about their acquisition of Wonderment below:

I'm excited to share the success story of Belieff Store, a business I recently collaborated with in the Netherlands. Their journey from being stuck in their minimum $$ to hitting 6+ figures has been remarkable. Belieff.com, founded by Rick van Geloven, started with a vision to provide warmth and comfort to dugouts during chilly winters. With my support in web services, Belieff has transformed into a successful e-commerce store, achieving significant financial success. #StartupSuccess #WebDevelopment #BusinessGrowth #DigitalTransformation #UnlockPotential #6FiguresGame #NetherlandsBusiness #WebsiteTransformation #SuccessStory #EntrepreneurshipJourney

Unicommerce is listed! Today is a very special day as we celebrate a really special milestone for a truly unique company. In the early days of 2015-16, we were a fledgling software business with negligible revenues and very few customers. The business had to justify its existence every day. On one side we had a lot of age-old dogmas telling us why it won’t work - that Indian businesses don’t pay for software, acquisitions and subsidiaries don’t work out, software businesses require huge amounts of capital to build and a lot more. But on the other hand, we had a stellar team, a large and growing eCommerce market, and most importantly the few customers who really loved what we did. There was not much we could do to fight the dogmas. But what we could do was to continue listening to our customers and serve them really well. While the future wasn’t so clear back then, we had absolute clarity on what we needed to do when we showed up to work every day. So, we kept building, step by step, and the fog of uncertainty kept clearing as we moved forward. Our wonderful team led by Kunal Bahl and Kapil Makhija, shared the ethos of not only leaving any job unfinished, but in fact doing it to the highest standards every time. Small things add up to truly great things over time. There were many stumbling blocks on the way, but we were anchored by the love of our customers and partners. In what would become Unicommerce’ way of working, we invested our efforts in building relationships and not just business partnerships. Along the way, we found some really helpful co-believers, who invested with us and provided further guidance. As we take on a new responsibility today of being a public company, we share the same ethos we did since the beginning – building solutions, not just products, building relationships, not just business partnerships. There is clarity and focus on what we need to do when we go back to work tomorrow, a strong conviction in the direction we’re taking, a stellar team under Kapil’s leadership, and a lot of love and support from our customers, partners, investors, friends and families. Thank you so much for having supported us along the way. It means the world to us.