Decent week, met too many people to even start on remembering 1 out of every 10 of their names. Working hard to remember the names of neighborhood associations members, business association members, teachers and nearby business workers nearby who will feed new customers to me. Also working on figuring out those people who have given me nice mentions on social media.
Sales have strengthened nicely over the week. I'll be able to cover all my fixed costs but not all my variable costs. I have a few thousand dollars in capital costs coming due soon that will probably come out of savings as well. Felling OK about my financial position and really want to knock out final payments on equipment and contractor work so I can concentrate on only grinding operational costs to break even.
Both my grinders broke this week. I haven't a clue why my drip grinder went down but I refurbished it myself and was able to strip and recalibrate it in about 15 minutes after I got someone to bring me some tools.
My espresso grinder was under warranty and was only down for an hour or so before a mechanic came and showed me what went wrong and how to fix it.
Both these things stressed me out badly but turned out to be OK in the end.
My roaster concentrates on pour over at his own shop and I'm mostly doing drip. One of the coffees he brought this week was not good as a drip coffee. I called him and complained that it tasted like shit. He came down to the shop and tried some grind and time adjustments and it still sucked. We agreed to give it a day to gas and see what it did. It still sucked. He had pulled out a dripper to brew it at his roastery that morning and texted me early that he thought it wasn't going to work and brought me some more suitable coffee. It made me glad, I like his coffee when it's good, I like him, I was getting ready to call my second choice. He's still on probation.
Probably seeing two cash transactions for each credit transaction. Way more than I would expect. Helps on the margin.
My body is holding up just fine. I'm generally healthier when I'm physically active, i think I can hold 70 hour weeks for a bit before I start to seriously burn out. Not as young as I used to be but in the past I've found that the more I work the more comfortable I am working long hours
Guess that's it. Loving my cold brew, learning my espresso machine and it's whims better, drip coffee could use some work.
Oh yea. Social media... Getting a ton of business from an app called Next Door. The people who it brings in are really nice and supportive. Facebook is a mixed bag. People complain that the shop isn't "nice" enough, people complain that I'm gentrifying the neighborhood. People mostly complain that I don't have a particular flavor of disgusting syrup or tell me that I really need to have a poetry night. Luckily I have no involvement in the Facebook page, I've never seen it, I'll never read it, and I think that if I did, it would only take me too a bad place. My vice president of social and print media gives me a summery, asks me answers to pertinent questions and deals with it herself.