Guess what? We sell paint

I was talking with a friend the other day, who was asking how business was going. After a brief discussion, he asked me about my networking efforts."Give me your elevator speech," he said.

"We sell printing and advertising specialties," I said. "Basically, if your name or logo goes on it, we can print it."

"That sucks," he replied (I told you we were friends, at least up until then.)

"You might as well say that you sell paint.""Paint?" I questioned. "I never said anything about paint."

"Of course you didn't. And a painter doesn't sell paint either. He sells a mood, a revitalization, a new look to a room or house. You can buy paint almost anywhere; that's not what he's selling. He's selling the entire service. He's selling the fact that you can look at a tiny swatch of paint, and he'll work with you to redesign a whole new look for your room or house. You'll trust him to come in, not leave paint stains on your carpet, and paint your walls to make the room look new and different. You're buying a lot more than paint -- that's what you have to get across to your customers, too."

Wow. I really, really hate it when he's right.

Especially that right.

So we tried to come up with something that encompasses all that we do. With over 700,000 items available, not to mention our experience in sales, marketing and graphic design, it's pretty tough to condense everything to 30 seconds or less. But here goes our new, revised elevator speech.

"We develop solutions to your marketing problems, and create ideas for your next sales meeting, promotion, trade show or giveaway involving all phases of printing, promotional products or corporate clothing."

Let us know what you think. Just don't ask us about paint.

Price vs. quality

I saw a great quote from sales trainer Zig Ziglar regarding the ongoing "price vs. quality" battle. The quote is pretty self-explanatory.

"Many years ago our company made a basic decision. We decided that it would be easier to explain price one time than it would be to apologize for quality forever... And I'll bet you're glad we made that decision, aren't you?"

As usual, something to think about....

The yard sale and the lesson learned

We were recently involved in our yearly neighborhood yard sale. You know, where you haul out all your junk to the curb to sell on a weekend and whatever doesn't sell gets hauled out to the curb during the week to get taken to a dump.

Anyway, this year's sale was a bit different for us. Nooooo, we didn't have someone come along and offer us a quadrillion dollars for our stuff/junk, nor did we find an original Picasso inside a lampshade. Instead we made money for a good cause.

While My Trophy Wife and I set about to try to sell things we longer used, our daughter set up a stand to benefit Alex's Lemonade Stand. I don't know where she got the idea, except that my daughter's name is Alexis (everyone calls her Alex), and the little girl who had the original Alex's Lemonade Stand was also named Alex.

Anyway, thoughout the course of the day, numerous people stopped to check out what we had for sale. Many also stopped for a cup of lemonade (at Alex's Alex's Lemonade Stand, as her sign said). Some didn't even take the lemonade, but merely donated money -- and these were the bargain-hunters who frequent yard sales. One family was driving by our corner stopped and donated $10 -- without ever getting out of their car OR asking for the lemonade.

It's amazing what a kid can do. The original Alex -- Alexandra Scott -- opened her stand in 2000 when she was 4 years old. She did it to raise money to help her doctors find a cure for her childhood cancer. In 2004, when Alex unfortunately passed at the age of 8, she had raised more than $1 million for childhood cancer research.

By January of this year, with the help of thousands of volunteers both young and old and the assistance of numerous Alex's Lemonade Stands, the Alex's Lemonade Stands Foundation has raised more than $10 million. (For more information, check out www.alexslemonade.org).

Now, my Alex didn't raise $1 million at our yard sale. But she worked hard to raise $73 that day for Alex's Lemonade Stand.

And us? We raised a grand total of $63 at our yard sale.

Guess who had a better day?