Wow! I have to tell you, I was so excited to have the opportunity to be able to speak with you today because every one of you shares my dream and my passion which is starting your own business. I mean you did it! I mean the nicest thing and the one item that we have to start off and celebrate is that a lot of people talk about doing things, you actually did it. So I want to first of all start off by congratulating you in having the guts and part of being in a small business is you definitely have to have guts.
One of the biggest opportunities was that I was able to beat the odds. You know the odds are not in our favor as a small business but I would tell you the recipe that I used and it used twofold. One was, being told by my mom to always manage my P’s and Q’s. The second was to listen to my dad about his advice and his philosophy. Well, when it came to managing my P’s and Q’s, I will tell you what the recipe consisted of. It was a quarter of a cup of passion, you got to absolutely love what you do. A quarter of a cup of perseverance, you’ve got to see it through. It’s all about attitude. A quarter of a cup of perfection, make it great. And the last P is the power of people. Those were my P’s and the Q was all about quality. If you have those 4 P’s, they absolutely will deliver on quality consistently over and over again.
To my dad, I would tell you his advice made a huge difference in my life and that first and foremost I came from an extremely wealthy family. My father was a welder. He was making $12,000.00 a year. My mom was busy to home raising 5 daughters and I of course was the baby and the reason I tell you that we came from a wealthy family is because my dada always said, you Debbie, true wealth is found in true friends, family and absolutely loving what you do.
My dad exhibited that behavior over and over again. He loved to weld. In fact, he loved welding so much that he considered it to be an art. He considered it to be an honor. Ill never forget sitting at the diner table and having him come home form work and he started to mention the fact that he had been given this tremendous honor and that his boss asked him to considered moving up in management; stop welding and start managing his friends and of course it would mean more money.
And my mom, of course slams down her fork and says, ‘Oh my gosh Ed, you’re going to go for the money, aren’t you?”, and he said, “no, I'm not’’. He said you all know how much I love to weld but more importantly my dads’ nickname was buddy. He said I don’t want to manage my friends; that’s not what I want to do. And so, as a result of dad’s behavior, and his message he constantly echoed, you’ve got to do what you love. That is true wealth.
Well, being the youngest of course, I was trying to side what could that be? And the one thing that I absolutely loved was making cookies. And all of us we all had our specialty. I had one sister that makes pancakes, another one that made the sandwiches, I was the cookie kid and what was fascinating is that I of course was using the ingredients we could afford. I was using margarine, imitation chocolate chips, fake vanilla, and I was making them in part and I owe these all to my mom to this very day.
My mom being so busy trying to raise all of us girls absolutely did not have a passion for cooking. She absolutely despised it. And as a result, everything that she put on the table was something that I just could not eat. And of course we had this rule, the rule was that anything that goes in the table, you have to eat and more importantly if you pout it on your plate you also have to eat it. Well, I tried to figure out every way that was possible to not eat my moms cooking. So that’s how I took up my passion for eating anything other than her cooking that was the discovery of just being involved in making anything sweet.
So, of course, wherever I went I would share cookies and I was able at the age of 13, I was able to secure my very first job. And of course, with that job came a tremendous opportunity and that was called a paycheck. And I remember going and shopping and taking that paycheck and actually getting the opportunity to buy something I dreamed of having. Does anybody remember the first item they bought with their very first paycheck, do you remember? What was it?
Well, I will tell you I went up the aisle and I looked at real chocolate, pure vanilla and double Grade A butter. And I went home and I whipped up some cookies using these ingredients and I put them in the oven, I let them bake, pulled them out, let them cool just slightly and I took my first bite, and oh my gosh!
I knew right then and there the importance of quality because butter tasted better. Yes! I mean there is no way I am going back, I will never. In fact when I was 13, I said I will never, ever do margarine again and it doesn’t taste like butter, it doesn’t have the flavor profile. And so at the age of 13 I absolutely knew quality. I could taste it and it meant something to me. And I said, I’ve just going to always use the very best ingredients because it makes a difference and of course I would make my cookies because I always was making cookies and I would take them to work. I would share them with the folks at the office.
And of course my very first job was working for the Oakland Ace and going back in time, in 1974 I was the first female foul line ball catcher, third base side for Charlie Findley. So that was a really important element in building your resume, the ability to catch stray balls. Well, anyway, here I am sharing my cookies wit the folks and of course Charlie Findley has this great idea that we should have a milk and cookie breaks especially when it was cold on certain nights and of course, I would bake the cookies and I’d take them out to the umpires and it was great because they would have a cookie-milk break and I got a chance to get constant reinforcement for how great my cookies were.
Well, I will tell you I was loving the experience because it was something that I enjoyed. I loved working, I loved making cookies and of course I loved the constant reinforcement I was getting when people would taste my cookies. Now, what I also learned working for the Oakland Ace came after hours and that was waiting after the game for one of my parents to come pick me up. You got to remember, this is in the day when families basically only had one car and so there are 7 of us in our family and I would wait and sometimes I didn’t know how long I would wait. And I would always wait in the parking lot where the players park their cars. And of course, that’s where fans would love to gather. I would stand, I would wait, and I would watch. I saw something that really impacted me and that was watching these amazing professional players, all very accomplished and realized that there were two types of players.
The first type of player I always knew, I knew exactly who they were, they would come walking out and it did not matter weather or not they had won or loss. They had such respect for the folks that would wait for them, that they would take the time to sign autographs and I have to tell you it was such a great feeling to watch kids, especially kids to see their eyes light up. I mean you could just change, you could just charge their life with such enthusiasm because they were so happy to get one of their superstars’ autograph on their mitt.
Well, of course, there were the other players and those players were always too busy and they wouldn’t take the time to stop. They wouldn’t take the time to sign. You know, they were just too important and I remember watching over and over again, watching these kids who moments before, where their whole eyes and their face was just lit up with joy. Where they’d be begging and asking and pleading, please just stop, please just sign and I would watch those same kids who sometimes would turn around and walk back towards me and they would have tears rolling down their cheeks.
And you know I realized that every one, everyday, every moment, every one deserves to feel important. it is as though, think about it, when you’re in your business if you could see that every person that comes in contact with you has an invisible sign that says, make me feel important. Well, magic can occur and so I didn’t know how I was going to use that in any kind of business because I was only 13 but it was something that I believed os strongly in. and of course I continued to work all through high school and apparently I really did not, I was not committed to developing my grades.
Unfortunately, I'm getting ready to graduate and I'm thinking what am I going to do? What do I want to be? And one of my objectives was to once I graduated from high school. I was going to enrol in a junior college. And the purpose behind that is, I was given a report card and it was measuring my ability. I wanted to go to a junior college to demonstrate to me that I could step in, use my ability but really make a difference in terms of getting A’s. In part because being the youngest of 5 girls and having 4 siblings, my sisters, I love them dearly but they had a special pet name for me. And they used to call me ‘stupid’, it was like, ‘hey, stupid’, ‘come here stupid’ and frankly that impacted me.
I decided that when I went on to junior college I wanted one thing, I wanted to get A’s and I made that commitment and I worked at it and sure enough I got my first A and then more A’s followed and I’ll tell you what; what came form that was great self confidence. That was the most important boost with setting my first baby step. And all of us want to climb to the top of the ladder but how do you get to the top? You have got to take one step at a time and you’ve got to set your goals within your ability to reach them.
So, here I am now filling my oaths and of course taking my cookies all through top junior college because it was just a part of me. And that’s when I got a chance to meet a very famous economist who I ultimately married or at least that’s what he told me, he was a famous economist. And here we are, Randy would always love to go and talk to people because he would like to talk about the economy, what was happening in the stock market, you know he was a true futurist. And people would love to listen to him and I would go to social gatherings, we have just gotten married and occasionally people were always enthralled by him but occasionally they would break a way and come up to me and they’d say, what do you do? And I would be like, I am a newly wed, I'm just here to support my husband, I'm a housewife and they’re like ‘oh’ that didn’t seem to impress them.
Now, or course that didn’t make me feel that great but I will tell you one of the biggest challenges that I had to overcome and I'm really glad it happened to me because it was the catalyst to get me going. And that was when we were invited by a very important potential client for Randy and of course Randy’s business was fledgeling it just was starting out and he need it to have some important clients to get his business going. And we got invited to their home for dinner and of course we’re nervous. We put on our Sunday best and we arrived.
Upon our arrival, there is a massive iron gate. So we get through the ironed gate and we drive up the circular drive way and there are these beautiful hand carved doors for the entry and Sandy opens up the door and he welcomes us into his home. And he takes us in to meet his wife who is in the kitchen and she’s putting the final touches on dinner and Sandy says to me, come join me in the library.
So, sure enough I followed Sandy and I'm walking down the hall and I realized that Randy is not behind me, he has stayed in the kitchen, okay. So, I walk into this beautiful wood paneled room, I mean it is not simulated for mica. And then I sat down on the most supple leather couch. That’s not Nagahide, and I'm trying to kind of get my bearings, get comfortable and I am so nervous and Sandy and I started talking.
And Sandy says to me, Debbie what exactly are you doing with your life? And I thought about that and I thought, okay, it’s my time. I said, you know Sandy, and I throw my shoulders back, I am actually trying to get orientated. And Sandy looks at me, he gets up, he walks over to a book case and then I saw that he grabbed it and I saw that its leather bounded, I saw that it is big and as he is getting close I saw it’s a dictionary. And Sandy has it in front of me and of course I'm still seated and he takes the book and he tosses it and I caught it, and he said listen. If you cannot speak the English language, then don’t speak. He said the word is not orientated, it’s oriented.
And Sandy left, he left the study and I was so embarrassed. And I sat there and I couldn’t help myself, tears just came rolling down and I thought, I so blew it. I'm embarrassed and I felt sorry for myself. And then as I sat there I realized, you know what never again. Never again do I want to feel the way I feel right now. And what nobody ever understood is that especially Sandy is that I too, I too wanted to be a somebody but how do you go about wanting to be a somebody and not knowing how? And as I sat and thought about that, my dad’s advice echoed. It echoed loud and clear. Debbie, what ever you do with your life, do it because you love it and you know when you love it, you’ll be great at it.
And all these time, I had been making cookies because I loved to make them, I love to eat them, I love to share them and every time I did, I got such wonderful feedback. So I made the decision, I was going to go in the cookie business that very night. I was going to do it and I was going to show Sandy. And I survived that night, I didn’t have really much to say. Later on the week, I gathered my family together and I sat them down ion the living room and I said, mom, dad, Randy, you’ve all been telling me how much you love my cookies and I’ve made the decision, I'm going in the cookie business.
Randy instantly pipes up and says, ‘oh, what a stupid idea’. He said that is never going to work and then my mom and dad chimed in and say what are you thinking? I mean Debbie, first of all you have no business experience, you do not have any money and you also don’t have a college degree.
And they basically said, it’s not going to work so forget it. I looked at them and I thought about what they said, and I thought you know what I'm not going to give up on me. I'm not going to give up one me. And literally the only thing I had, the only thing I had was a recipe. That’s the only thing I had. Now, it’s about beating the odds but I knew, I knew at that point in time that the greatest failure was to not at least try.
So, pursuing with this dream, with this hope, the first thing that I needed to do of course was raise the dough. I stopped and I did exactly what I think what most people do, I would dial in for dollars. I opened up the yellow pages. I looked at bank branches. I’d get an appointment. And once I had my appointment, I would make cookies because when I went in to talk about my cookie business, my business plan, they wouldn’t understand what I was talking about because it could be like a commodity. What made mine different? What was special? So, I went ahead and made sure that I had the product with me. They had to taste the difference.
And then, of course I would go into my closet, look for my very best begging and grovelling clothes and then I was off to see the bankers. And here I go, I had such high hopes, I am sure that everybody is going to want to finance me. So, I didn’t even anticipate they would be hard. So, I go in, I'm asking for the money and of course, their response was thank you so much for coming and chocolates smeared ion their lips, cookie breathe but we’re not interested. And I have to tell you that kept happening over and over, and over again.
And I was really getting this hardened because I would call, I would take my product, I would ask for the money and it would be constantly no, no, and no. well, once again my mom, she comes to my aid. Shes literally riding in that white horse. She looks at me shes like Debbie, its not working just give up. nobody wants to finance this business, its not meant to be, just give up. Well, those were the magical words I needed to hear because yes I was very frustrated but I needed to hear, give up because giving up is the easiest thing that any of us can do.
One of the reasons why you’re here today is because you didn’t give up. You believed in you, you wouldn’t take no for an answer. And I realized that that was going to be the last thing I did. And so everyday, literally, I had to wake up with the mantra and the mantra was, it really made a difference. I know, there is somebody out there who wants to say yes. I just have to keep knocking, I just have to keep searching, I just have to keep calling, I have to ask and when I do, I will find them.
So it allowed me the space to accept the No’s but always believing that no was right around the corner that the person that wanted to say yes, I had to find him. Well, ultimately I did get the financing and the gentlemen said to me, you know what Debbie I absolutely love your passion. I love your product and I will loan you the money at 21% prime. I will tell you, it was the cheapest money I could get. It was the only money but I took that and I used the money in terms of a loan and what I realized, the moral of the story is when it comes to asking for financing the first and foremost thing is you’ve got to believe in you.
Your product and service have to measure up to it. The other thing is to look for very old aging bankers because right after I have made the loan, he safely retired. Okay, so then, now I had the money and I put the store together, our very first store is in California right down the street from Stanford University and I got it all together and I'm ready for grand opening day and I'm excited. And of course, if you have a business plan and when I get ready to do my grand opening day, it was quite. I was just getting ready to leave and my husband says to me, “Oh Deb what are you going to do today in terms of your financial objectives? And I said, I actually haven’t thought about that I just wanted to get the store open and make sure everything is running.
He says I bet you can’t even do $50.00. I went of course I could do $50.00. That was going to be so easy. So, I go, I opened up the store, I have the cookies, I’ve got the coffee, I am ready to go. I've got the brownies, I am ready. I'm just thinking this is going to be so great, everybody loves my cookies and I'm just going to be this big hit. Well, as I stood there and the day was starting to wear on, I stood there and the day continued to wear on. I have to tell you, it was really frightening because reality set in. it was like knowing that everything you’ve dreamed for, everything you worked for, everything you hoped for was coming to a screeching end. I was failing. I was failing big time. and as I stood in that store, I thought my gosh if I stand I will absolutely go out of business but I'm from the land of whatever I do, I have to do it intensely.
I've got to do everything I can to make it work and if its not meant to be, okay. So I thought well if I stand here and do nothing I will be out of business. So, what I did is, I placed cookies on a cookie sheet. I left my store and with my phenomenal experience with the bankers I'm begging, I went to the streets and stopped people, I mean I was a woman with a mission. I was determined and I stopped people and I said, here! Will you just taste these cookies? And you know what, some people did and they followed me back to my store. I will tell you, that was the greatest day of my life because I rang up $75.Yes! It was the best but what did I learn?
I learned that this whole try and buy methodology really works. My customers didn’t come to me, I had to go out and get them. I had to do it differently. I found that if I brought my cookies to them then they could decide wether or not it was worthy of a purchase. Interestingly enough, we concluded that the more that we gave away, we could actually determine that for every five cookies and we actually built a science around this but for every cookie sampled one person would buy. We would tie that into an average check which was like $2.63 and we could then project the volume of our store based on the amount of people that would walk in front of it.
So, there is so much opportunity called the try and buy. So, stop and think about that with your products or your services. I ran into people today that have a product or a service that is easy to carry and they never have it with them. I think that you should have whatever you’re selling; you should have it with you 24/7 if you can carry it with you.
The other thing is I had the most wonderful experience with customers. When I was staring out, I had customers that of course I knew the exact time of day they would show up, I knew exactly what cookie they wanted and how they took their cookie but I’d tell you when I knew that I had something really special was when my customers started to call in sick. I'm serious, I mean I would customers that would call me and say Debbie, I won’t be in today, I'm home with a stomach flu and I knew that, I've never been in the cookie business actually.
I've never been in the cookie business. I'm in the feel good feeling business. My job is to sell pleasure. My job is to exceed expectations. My job is to sell an experience. That’s what I’m the business of doing. Our job was simply to make people happy and I always said to my team, there is only one register I ever want you to look at never the cash register. I want you to look at one register and its right here, your mission is to just make somebody smile and do it in the form of the best, warmest, freshest cookie you can deliver but we were in the business of fun.
So, here I have this business now where it is starting to take off. I've got customers that I love and I've got a product I adore and it starts to grow. My team comes to me and they said, Debbie lets grow, let’s build or people have come to me and said, how do you make a million dollars? And I've always said, you know what, if you chase money you will never catch it because it always starts with a dream. It always starts with passion and today, I've sold Mrs. Fields, I retired in 2000. And I will tell you, today I have five daughters, I have five step children so it keeps me very busy but I will tell you some of the elements of the P’s and Q’s, the recipe starting with the issue of perfection. When I started my business, I knew there’s always competition.
So, I decided you have to take your product or service to the extreme. Why? Because if you don’t somebody else will. So, in building the recipe I've added so many chocolate chips to the sough that I knew I had achieved enough when the chips no longer fit and it was like chocolate nirvana. And then after that, I did the same thing with butter. You know how much I love butter, butter taste better. I took the butter, I added so much butter to the point where my cookies turned into pancakes and I said, you what, I've taken it too far. I've taken it to the extreme where I've gotten too far.
My mission is to build a recipe that would last. My mission was to actually stand on a foundation of the very best because I believed that somebody can make one as good if they chose to, but my mission was to make it the best. So, build your product or service to the highest possible standard, take it to the extreme.
The second was setting standards. The standards were as an example, since we were in a business of happiness I knew that any cookie that was fresh and warm would make our customers happy. It also created activity in our stores. It also created aroma. So, what we did is, I put on a holding time and I said that any cookie that’s not sold within 2 hours has to become a cookie orphan. And we have to take our little orphans and we have to find a good home for them and so would give them and donate them to blood centers for people who were giving blood and at the same time its not like the cookies’ self-distracted but the objective was to set your standard so high that the flaws would be considered excellent.
That was my goal because I always know that when you’re making cookies all day long, you earned your reputation on every cookie, every minute that your customers in front of you so it was constantly knowing that you earned it. the other P’s was a philosophy that entered Mrs. Fields, right after we’ve opened up our second store and that was when I came in to the store and I saw customers standing out and we had lines and it was like a wonderful busy day.
I walked into the store on a surprise visit and I saw that the cookies were absolutely over baked. They were over baked and over mixed. I walked in to the gentleman who was in charge and I said, hey what do you think of these cookies because I thought possibly I didn’t teach him and he looked at me, looked at the line out the door and he said, oh Debbie they’re good enough. And I said, good enough, good enough never is. Stop and think about that, how many times do yu say its good enough? How many times are you wiling to settle?
Well, right then and there I tossed my cookies and I made a commitment and interesting enough this is fascinating. I knew I had no cookies to sell because they were all over baked. I had lines out the door and so I went to the customers and I said I had to tell you something, I over baked the cookies but here the deal. If you would be so kind to forgive me and come back and anything that you will buy, I’ll give it you for free. Anything, whatever amount, all you have to do is tell me and I will take care of it. Our customers not only came back but they were amazing. I have one customer who would say, you should get a basket for a dozen one cookie, our customers are incredible, they were just so amazing but it was a give and take.
So, it was a way I had a bad experience, it was a way to build upon these experience by letting the customers know that we put a guaranty on our bag. We put a guaranty. Our job is to make sure that everybody is happy and if I made a mistake I wanted people to know I stood behind it. That’s why I put my name on the company, on the bag and in everything we did to the people equation, the power of people.
Remember how I told you about my report card, about how it measured my ability. Well, it never measured my attitude and I guaranty you that I think that attitude is absolutely the most important thing you can have especially as a small business owner because it is was causes you to build a business. It is what causes you to move mountains and make the impossible possible. It starts with that attitude.
My favorite line with my five daughters is, wether you think you can or cant, you’re right. The moment you wake up and say I can do it, you might not know how to do it but I can do it, you will find your way. The moment you say you can’t, you’re defeated. And so, I wanted to fill up the Mrs. Fields stores with people who have that attitude. Well, how could I find them? Well, the first part was to make sure, were talking about passion, we’re talking about loving what you do. Well, that’s essential when you have people who work for you. I basically had people auditioned for a position at Mrs. Fields and what I would do is would bring them in and they’d pout in their application and I’d say; hey, come on in sit down and eat some cookies with me and tell me what you think.
Well, they would take a bite and I’d get two types of responses. Most of time it was, “oh my gosh! I love these”, they’re so buttery and chocolaty and soft, and chewy and I just had like more adjectives and I love it! And then, they were other folks who would say; I'm sorry, I don’t eat sugar. I do not like chocolate and I'm like, okay. So, the first thing is, I knew that if they did not love it, they could not sell it. The other thing is, I'm really lazy, I don’t like to write sales manuals because selling is something that you can do very effectively when you love it, it’s very hard to do when you don’t. So, I had to make sure they love the product.
The second thing I did is, after I knew they love the products I had to make sure that the try and buy methodology of going out, giving the product away and bringing customers in was going to continue. So, I would give them a tray of cookies, I would send them out in the streets and I’d say bring customers back and mention your name and I’ll give them a great deal. So I set the expectation absolutely in the very beginning of what was expected so if they brought customers back to the counter then, I knew they could sample and they could build.
The third part of this test and its still the best way to find cookie people today, it still works and that is to ask them to stand in front of the store and I'm always there with them supporting them and say, would you do me one favor? Just one simple favor and they’re like, yes what? I'm like, would you sing my favorite song and they’re like, what? Happy birthday, would you sing Happy Birthday?
Here is what I was looking for, remember that we are in the business of happiness and we’re also in the business of having a lot of fun but I was looking for people that absolutely everyone can sing Happy Birthday. The question is, will they? When it comes to being a small business owner I have to tell you, you have to do whatever it takes to be obvious, whatever it takes. People have to know you exist, so my mission was to find people that would help me be obvious. So if they can whip out Happy Birthday, I'm telling you we had a unified team.
The other P’s is that once I had my team in place, I never had to write a customer service manual. I mean if you ever stop and think about it, customer service comes from the heart, it always has. I bet you everybody in this room has the best customer service person ever, would you agree because you get it, you understand. Well, why is it that, stop and think about it, companies are hiring people who hate customers and then write manuals on how to care for them. I don’t get it. I mean, when was the last time truly when a customer needed something that you had to go to a book to decide how to treat the. It has to be instant, it has to be personable and it has matter.
So once I had my team in place, all I had to do is teach them how to make the product but talking about making I never just talked about making, it was philosophy. Everyday we are in business, we, our philosophy was to literally make the best cookies. Fresh, warm and hot and serve them in a way that makes people feel good. We are in the feel good feeling business. That’s what we did everyday and that was why we existed and everybody was part of that of that team. Now, when you think about the bumps along the road, did I have them? absolutely challenging times because part of it was not really knowing all the aspects of building a business but one of the things that I did do that was really beneficial for me as a small business is that every hour we have a sales goal.
Remember I tole you about tehb$50.00, the goal of $50.00 and I got $75.00. Well, you know out annual sales if I projected out $300,000.00 a year for a store, I would break that down into hourly increments because there was nothing worse in my mind to have the PNLs close at the end of the month to lose money. I didn’t have the any financial ability to lose money. I had everything on the line.
So, I broke my business down into a format which I called day-by-day management and a result I knew that I had to do like $600 this day but I broke it down into hourly increments so I only had to do $60 this hour. That allowed me to manage my inventory and my staffing and as a result, it also allowed me to stay in control because there’s nothing worst when you have a sales goal to be so far behind; you don’t believe you can make up but if you do it hourly, it actually makes it fun, it makes it a game.
So we would have these hourly objectives and then every hour we would also trade positions. I wanted everybody to know how to make the cookies, to know how to take care of the customer, to bake. In fact, everybody thought that their cookies were better than mine. And so, as a result we were all crossed trade. A part of the reason for doing that is so you have freedom as a business owner to have a break. You should absolutely train everybody around you to do what you know how to do so that you have the leverage to grow. And more importantly, if you do want to open up a second location, should that in fact be something that you’re involved in. don’t open the location until you’ve taken a three-week vacation and you allow your current team to operate without you. that way, you’ll see if you’re an effective manager but in going through the tough times, yes there are always challenge in businesses, you know that especially now but at this point, this is also an opportunity to get personal, to think creatively, to reach out, to do what you’re doing right now.
I will tell you, I think about a line from a book of poetry and that is you can never experience joy without also experiencing sorrow. And I realized that when my greatest moment were there and I love them and I wanted to keep them coming, I also realized that I'm going through some tough times. Tough times make you better. It was kind of like when I was failing. What made me better is that I had to be challenged. I had to be closed to the brink of losing my business to get me to get me to do something different. And so I really believed that during those tough times it is when you reach out and explore new ways to reach your customers.
The next one is a line from Winston Churchill which is never rest on your lures. I think that people have always said where do you get your energy from and part of it is that I wake up every morning and I'm so excited. I'm so excited that I was given a chance at the American dream because the dream is alive. And I'm so excited that I got a chance to do something that I still love to do, I still bake cookies. I mean, when I go to peoples homes I'm still always toting my cookies that I made from scratch because it makes me happy. And so, for me, I'm just a believer that everyday is grand opening day. You can never rest on your lures. Don’t take it for granted. Go out there and do it everyday. Fire up those engines and make it happen.
And then when I stopped and think about the P’s and Q’s, I'm going to end with basically five distinctive points. Number one: Passion, passion is the best advice I got from my father which is true wealth is found in family and friends and absolutely passionately loving what you do. You got to love what you do and you’ll be great at it and you’re doing that.
The second is everyone, everyone deserves to feel special. Everyone deserves to feel important. Now, stop and think. How did that translated to me, you don’t want to sell a product or service, you want to sell an experience. You want to absolutely delight and indirectly it is also the power of people.
When I was starting my business and this is just impacted, the impact of making people feel important. I'm starting my business and I've called a very famous chocolate company. I called them up and I said, hi. And I spoke to the salesman, his name was Warren 4618 and this is 30 years later and I still remembered his name. so I'm taking to him on the phone and I'm like Warren I'm getting ready to open up a cookie store and I would love to test your chocolate and I was wondering if I could get 25 pounds. And Warren said oh listen sweetie, if you want to 25 pounds of chocolate from us you’re going to have to buy a minimum of 10,000. I'm sorry there is nothing we can do to help you. and I went oh, okay, thank you. so then I called another chocolate company and I’ve never even heard of it. it was an industrial supplier. And, of course I changed my presentation skills and I'm like, hi, I'm opening up this itsy bitsy store and is there any way possible and the salesman is listening to me his name Bob Éclair and he is ‘oh, okay. He is listening to my presentation and he says, I’ll tell you what, you know what the 25 pounds of chocolate you want is way too small for our trucks to deliver and so I'm like ‘ oh, okay I understand’ and he says ‘no, you don’t understand’. It is not too small for the trunk of my car, where are you? Bob Eclair made me feel like a million bucks that moment. And you know what, he is taking the time to make me feel like I mattered, has caused Mrs. Fields to buy in excess of 25 million pounds from his company and its because you know what, he made me feel special.
Of course Warren continued to call me over and over saying ‘okay, I know I blew it’ but, you know the power of people and the loyalty.
The third is, NO is an unacceptable answer. I have to tell you, people love to say no. I mean grated I love to say No to my five daughters because it’s the first word out of my mouth. No! I can’t do it. Especially after they listened to my presentations, they’re like ‘mom, you can’t say no’. so, I will tell you that truly there’s just people love to say no. wether its coming to financing, its coming to buying your product so to me, remember its all about attitude. Wether you think you can or cant, you’re right but more importantly one of the techniques that I have learned lately is I just asked for what I want which is especially if I'm dealing with the service provider I’ll just call in and say, could you put somebody on the phone that can say yes? I start at there or go to the front desk and say I just need yes person. Anybody here able to say yes? And I actually did this the other day, you know I did. I could not believe it. You know the airlines are absolutely, just wonderful customer service agents. Okay, I was running late. I can imagine how that happened and I how up and I said does anybody want to say yes and let me on the plane even though I'm late, and this guy said ‘yes, I’ll do it’, I'm like ‘he did it! I made it!’. I mean I had like less than 15 minutes, that’s impossible in these day and age but its because he said ‘yes, I’ll say yes’. So you set the stage, call people and just say I need somebody who could say yes, who could say yes and make decisions because it will open doors.
The forth, the philosophy of excellence in at Mrs. Fields, good enough never is. Celebrate greatness, continuously improve upon average and do not let mediocrity ever settle in. it really matters, good enough never is. Pat yourself, it black and white, make it great, celebrate or improve it.
Last but not the least is, the greatest failure is not to try and this is where perseverance all really comes in. you can’t give up; you can’t throw in the towel. If I have listened to everybody who said you can’t, it’s a fad, it won’t work, it’s stupid; you know what, I won’t be here today and I guess my message to each and everyone of you is that you have graduated, you’re not dreamers, you are doers. And you know what, if there’s anything that I can do to touch upon you about today and cozy is to really take and put your actions into place, make it happen. Ask for the business; absolutely connect to a network because when you reach for the sky, it will take you there.
Thank you so much.
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