Publicity! Yay!

Woot!

There's also this! Although the term 'sciency doodads is a bit odd.

My Store is a Host to Multiple Diseases!!

and they are sooo freaking cute!

Zot's Big Adventure

Zot has taken to trying to run out of the apartment when I open the door to go to the laundry. Considering I had four loads to do yesterday (things pile up when you have few free days) this gave her plenty of opportunity to try rushing between my legs as I came in. Reminds me of my old escape artist kitty Vela, who escaped once too often. I caught her and carried her back in about three times, but apparently on my last trip I didn't see her escape.

So this morning I noticed a lack of Zot running around the apartment, meowing for kitten food. I checked outside the apartment twice but no results. A third attempt, called her name, resulted in her meowing back and returning to the apartment.

At least I noticed her being gone. SaraBelle once escaped to the basement and hid behind a door for a while. A neighbor asked me if I had a black cat and I realized I hadn't seen her. She never was an intrusive kitty.

Speaking of SaraBelle, its almost the 1 year anniversary of her death. Not really anything I can say about that that I haven't already said on blogger.

Black Friday

.....eeep!....

I has a storefront!

Bleh.

Philadelphia Marathon shutting down Main St. + sucky, rainy weather = slow sales day.

:(

A day off.

After working pretty much seven days a week since September 15th, with the exception of the two days after the floor sanding, I finally let my assistant manager take over for a day and I had a day off. I went shopping around the Delaware avenue box stores, and yes, some of the shopping was for the store. Overall, I was not as shell-shocked as I thought I would be and actually managed to not call the store every ten minutes. Phew.

And know I have some food in the fridge. I will go to the store tomorrow, but I am not planning on opening or closing. Mostly I will be there since Saturday is when lots of folks I know or are important show up and I would like to be present.

More Publicity!

I had an interview with a writer from the City Paper yesterday. He will be adding a small article in the 'newly opened' section about my store. It should appear in this weeks or next week's CP. Yay!

The Store Moves Along.

With this being '2nd Saturday' in Manayunk and me actually having at least a sign on above the doorway there was actually a decent number of visitors to the store. We did OK considering that it was almost all small ticket items. A few family friends (and family!) showed up, including my brother and one of my classmates from High School. Among my family and friends word of the store seems to be spreading. My hope is that word will get out among the general public so that I don't have to completely depend on the 'family and friends' program forever. Overall, those who see how the store turned out have been rather impressed, which is a good sign.

I did have a couple of pictures of the store, at least of the first floor, for those who have not had the chance to visit:

It is good to get online attention for the store

Skepchick!

My semi-annual running joke.

I've only been dual posting to livejournal for a few months. But my wall of clocks has been a running joke as to why I don't look forward to daylight savings.

A Vast Improvement

OK, I'm not rolling in dough, but I did get much better results today after taking a simple action:

I put stuff on display in the windows. People walking by got to see telescopes, radiometers, and many other things on display. That got them to stop and drop in. Many folks were just checking us out, but they indicated that they would be back for X-mas shopping. Yay!

My 'Grand' opening is tomorrow and I did want to take the time to thank folks who have helped make this possible:

Special thanks to violet_amy for helping out with damn near everything, especially during the last few days before opening when my sanity was questionable.

To Math5 for helping with the painting and loaning me her Boom Box, which I fear I may have partially destroyed and now owe her a new one.

To my parents, who came out numerable times to help me paint, assemble furniture label products, fix lighting, clean floors, and dozens of other things.

To Ianraven, for designing a cool store logo and putting up with my need for card designs at the last minute.

To my brother Jim, who helped me drum sand the floors, which were in terrible shape, in one long marathon day of power sanding.

To my sister-in-law Ann, who helped to paint the baseboard and shelves, and has designed newspaper ads for the store.

To my good friend Bill, for building the window risers that allowed me to put product on the display...it has proven more important than I thought!

To Berrick, whose timely computer networking advice averted what could have shut down my ordering schedule for days.

To my friend Adam, for referring me to a good lawyer, who in turn referred me to a good accountant...etc.

And to all my friends for their support and advice. Thank you all. Now the hard part will be making this store a success.

Not much of a start...

..but I suppose I didn't expect much, given that I have no real signage or things in the window. The grand total for today was 1 real customer for $2.50. Lots of folks form the neighborhood droped by to with me luck. It probably just as well, as the day was spent labeling stuff from the 34 boxes that arrived today. Eeek! We got through most of it, and should kill off the rest tomorrow. With any luck, I can do more telescopes tomorrow and have things looking good for the "Grand Opening" on Saturday.

Except for not having signs. But at least that has improved from 3-4 weeks to the end of next week.