The Things We Do, the People We Meet

One year ago, I got a call. It was the President of an architectural firm in San Francisco saying one of the samples I had sent to their office was causing a ripple. It seems the EVP was building a new house in Marin County, and the handscraped walnut floor was perfectly in line with his vision for his home. Would I please follow up with him?

Today, a year later, that new home is finished. Along the way, we also produced a dark walnut staircase of the architect's own design, to match the dark walnut floor. The owners have moved in, the project looks fantastic, and the owners are very vocal in their delight for their new home, and their new custom-made Plantation product.

This is no ordinary home. It was designed from the ground up to be LEED certified at the platinum level - the ultimate "green" accomplishment in residential building. We just submitted our finalized list of LEED-compliant credentials relating to the hardwood floors and stairs. The home is scheduled to be the subject of a Sunset Magazine photoshoot, with other publications in the wings.

We at Plantation had the great opportunity to work with some very nice and very talented people: Erin and Robin at Erin Martin Design of St. Helena; Mike MacDonald and Mike Dwyer of MacDonald Construction and Development of Oakland, the residential LEED kings!; and Bruce Brudvig of First, Last, and Always Flooring in San Francisco, a highly competent flooring contracting firm for the installation of our floor and stairs.

And of course the owners, Scott and Tracy Lee, are not only practicing professionals in the design field, but are delightful people as well.

******

Another project is also completed: the custom-designed parquet floor for Paramount. I attended a closed set filming last week to see the floor in action. The commentary from all and sundry is that the floor is well received, beautiful, and, as solid wood, probably the only "real" item on the entire set! Everything else is styrofoam, or plastic, or some mystery material that the set constructors use. Very interesting.

And of course, very entertaining. All the players were in action: the actors that everyone recognizes, the director, the cinematographer, all the assistants. I'd guess fifty people were on this large set, applying makeup, running back and forth, and, many of them, just waiting around for the next thing to happen. And the equipment! From huge cameras, to major lighting contraptions, to gizmos that I haven't a clue the use for.

When I arrived in my car, the parking lot was almost full. Mercedes and Jaguars everywhere - at the curb, in the stalls, double-parked. The parking attendant told me two shows were filming simultaneously: "Dinner with Schmucks" (my movie), and the TV series Glee.

Being inside the gates "on business" at a movie studio such as Paramount is an experience I, and most people, don't have an opportunity to do often, if ever. The surroundings are as one would imagine, right down to the guy walking around with the Viking helmet. The cooks were cooking a cafeteria-style meal in the rain, the golf carts were whizzing by, the wardrobe people were seeking shelter for the racks of clothes. The little "streets" between the huge sound studios are narrow, and filled with stars' trailers and equipment trucks. There is seemingly constant motion on all sides.

But the real action, of course, is inside the sound stages. One can't get in there without an escort, although once in, I was welcomed to stay as long as I wanted. There was plenty to see for the uninitiated like me, but everyone else was just working another workday. Too bad I was limited for time, or I would have stayed all day.

******

I was a long way from Hollywood the week before. I was happy to get a chance to pay a year-end visit with the hidden power behind our company, then spend two days presenting the products and services of Plantation to some serious hitters in the hospitality design business in Dallas. I was surprised that so much is going on in Dallas in the global hotel and restaurant arena. Most design firms I've visited in recent months resemble ghost towns, at least compared to their formal glories. Not these people. They're on the move, and pressed for time. They've got projects down the street and around the world. All very energizing, and hopeful for the survival of this genre worldwide.

I had with me my usual complement of high-end wood flooring and parquet samples. All the designers were polite to me, and admired my goods. But when I got to our specialty floors, the copyrighted ones, the designers were gasping, and calling in their colleagues. I haven't had so much fun in quite a while. The planned thirty minute meetings became unplanned ninety minute meetings. If the comments are accurate, we'll be in big business in places I didn't even know about before now. Invigorating.

******

My son Michael is a graphic- and web designer, and commented to me recently that he was making some web designs without having a commission for them, because he thinks some people don't know what they want until they see it.

This idea of people not knowing is not new, but still it's very perceptive. How many times have we asked for an idea from a client - the "what are you looking for?" question. Often, there's no good answer, or it's the "I'll know it when I see it" answer.

In this spirit, we recently made a new parquet panel design in black walnut and red leather, just because we could. Somebody said, "That looks like the Wynn in Las Vegas." So I called our rep in Las Vegas, and sent the email photo. She thinks it will sell, so now we're pitching Wynn for their next remodel.

A tip of the hat to son Michael for reminding the old man about some of the truisms of dealing in creative but abstract ideas with people.

I've told everyone who will listen that Plantation isn't just about making and selling flooring. Plantation is about being the "go-to" company for collaborating on great flooring ideas. We like to dream up new things, and we have the factory that can make those new ideas become real. What a concept! I want for Plantation to be that company that every creative designer wants to call when they're dreaming up something new. They will find fertile ground here.

Opposite Ends of the World

I have a lot of fun in my job.

Most people know that the fall season in New England is beautiful. This is equally true in New York, and especially Long Island. I was there on business in October, and it was delightful in every way - the weather, the scenery, the food, the people. I'm ready to go back as soon as possible.

Now, I have just returned from another business trip, this time to Hawaii - the opposite end of the world. It is the same story - delightful in every way. Good weather, good scenery of course, great people.

Like I said, I have fun in my job.

New York was buzzing as usual. The overall national economy remains fairly rotten, but something's always going on in New York! Our group of architects and interior designers are not as busy as in years past, but they're uniformly still in the game. It's good to see existing friends, and to be introduced personally and professionally to new ones. I especially enjoyed meeting our new friends at Martha Stewart Omnimedia - a truly amazing enterprise when viewed from the inside.

Out in the Hamptons, houses were visibly being packed up for the winter. Yet at the same time, we discovered lots of planning being done for remodeling and sprucing up during the imminent unattended winter season. The concept of the Plantation customized prefinished high-end wood floor is not commonplace, and even somewhat counter-intuitive, so we have informing and educating to do about the advantages we bring.

Hawaii, at the opposite end of the world, is simply the scene of interrupted progress. Large commercial projects sit idle, from steel skeletons to "see through" buildings. There are tourists, of course. I'm convinced half of Japan was in attendance in Honolulu. But the fully-funded project under active construction in Hawaii is a rarity at the moment.

I again enjoyed seeing existing friends, and making new ones. Our exhibit at the Group 70 Sustainable Materials showroom in Honolulu was one of my first stops, since I had not actually seen it in person since it was established earlier this year. I was happy to have the opportunity to address the entire management and staff of Group 70's architects and designers - this firm Group 70 is a very prominent and progressive firm in the green building space.

In addition, I established some new venues for prospective customers to see our products on display in Honolulu. Details of the locations of these showrooms will appear on our website (www.plantationhardwood.com) in short order.

My good friend and our representative in Hawaii, Conrad Parducci (Parducci Hardwood Floors) and I took a wrong turn walking in downtown Honolulu, and ended up in the middle of the filming of a scene for the TV series "Lost." Look for us in an episode depicting a snowy street scene in, supposedly, New York City. If we survive the cutting room floor, that is. (Conrad's a good-looking guy, and we're thinking maybe he's been "discovered.")

I have a lot of fun in my job.

The neighbor islands in Hawaii have a different tempo and a different flavor than Honolulu and Oahu, and I'm more optimistic about business out there. Some of our long-suffering bids are coming to fruition now, and the area of heavy money real estate investing is starting to rumble again in Maui, Kauai, and the Big Island. I believe Hawaii will be a good market again, and sooner rather than later.

Back home in Los Angeles, we were invited to propose (successfully, it turned out) a flooring design for a movie set currently in production. Look for our intricate custom parquet floors in the interior mansion scenes of the upcoming film starring Steve Carell entitled "Dinner with Schmucks," in theaters later in 2010. My visit to the Paramount Studios lot for this project was complete with approval meetings with Oscar-level movie professionals, and of course, the attendant star-sightings.

I have a LOT of fun in my job.

Getting Out and About

I had a chance to get out and about last week.

The nominal reason was attendance at the annual Hospitality Design Boutique Show in Miami, as a walker, rather than our more normal role as an exhibitor. Trade show participation is expensive, and I'm sure I have plenty of company these days in evaluating where to spend the promotional bucks.

So what did I think of HD Boutique? I was able to have some meetings at the small show, so that means some key people were there. I also missed some meetings (for "nobody's fault" reasons), and couldn't reschedule due to travel plans. So that means some key people were there, but not for long - maybe one day, or even just a few hours. The show is small, and can be navigated in one day or less.

Not one wood flooring company was exhibiting. Our major competitors apparently stayed away in droves. Perhaps that tells a story in itself.

I spent another couple of days in South Florida, looking for signs of commercial life. I didn't find much, at least not at the high-end, where we live. Some large projects are under construction up the coast, but are rumored to be high-priced housing with low-priced components, such as cheapie commodity wood flooring or low-end tile. What consumer would knowing buy into that?

I visited a project using our Plantation custom teak plank and parquet floors, and I got some photos of the installation under way. They're posted on our website in the Gallery.

Even though Florida seems dull (unless we're missing it), other geographies around the nation are more productive. Indeed, our Oxnard factory is now running full blast again - to the point where we needed more skilled folks making our custom floors, and weekly overtime, just to meet our promised lead times!

Imagine that... carefully calculating lead times! And overtime! And hiring! Must say I'm pleasantly surprised, and of course very excited.

I have long predicted that any recovery in flooring orders will exchange one set of problems for another set. My projection has been that raw materials will suddenly get scarce in any recovery scenario, particularly if the pent-up demand we have been expecting manifests itself in orders requiring immediate delivery!

And that is exactly what is happening... many of our new orders are actually old projects now getting funded and transacted. The demand frequently now is that we make custom floors fast! We ourselves can do that, because we own and operate the California factory, rather than outsource our production to China, Europe, or even down the street.

But no manufacturer, including us, controls the stream of manufacturing inputs such as lumber, finish, and add-on machinery. That pipeline of materials is predictably drier than most people expected. Fortunately, we have some defensive wood inventory, and several of our selected suppliers are well-stocked as well. The likely outcome of this situation is that orders will get made from existing raw materials inventories, then will get delayed as the raw materials disappear.

This scenario of depleted raw material pipelines suggests the wisdom of buying now rather than later. Again, I say...

Imagine that!

On a More Personal Note...

I have two things on my mind today. Two things that are personal, not business.

First, I opened the mail one day last week at home in San Francisco, and found a bill. Not just a bill, but a traffic ticket. A traffic ticket fine worth $125, for failure to stop at a stop sign in a municipal park in Los Angeles.

It unnerved me. I was totally blanked out on being stopped by a policeman and being given a citation. I simply could not in my mind conjure up this scene. Had I spent some "blackout" time? Do I have a mental thing going on? Are all the synapses not firing?

Actually, turns out I'm fine. There was no policeman, there was no traffic stop. Just a ticket in the mail for $125. And a link to a video.

I ran to my computer, accessed the link, and watched a short video of a car with my license plate fail to make a dead stop at a corner stop sign, then turn right. A short video taken by a fixed-in-place video camera, mounted somewhere near an intersection in a municipal park in Los Angeles, that I happened to drive through on my way to somewhere else.

The mailed citation was signed by a park ranger (a park ranger!), attesting to the fact that he had viewed the video, and deemed it an accurate portrayal of me committing a moving violation. And thus the citation, totally impersonal, in the mail.

Am I guilty? Apparently I am! It's on video!

But this bothers me - a lot. It's way too sneaky. Way too "Big Brother is watching." If I am to be arrested, I want to be arrested in person, by a real law enforcement officer. An officer who is charged with public safety, and who has observed me recklessly endangering public safety, and who is justified in arresting me. Not by a park ranger sitting in a darkened, windowless room watching videos of cars going around a corner and cranking out $125 demand letters.

Creepy.

What's even more creepy is that this citation is not an infraction of Santa Monica statute, or California law, but rather is just between me and the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority. No record will be sent to the California DMV, or my insurance company. Seemingly, my fine derives from my infraction of a private traffic law.

Should I pay this? Looks official. But the fine print makes it seem off-the-books. Hmmm...

By the way, the monitored address is 15601 Sunset Blvd., in Temescal Canyon Park. Watch out, all you citizen suspects. There's a park ranger's video camera watching you drive by, every day, hoping to collect another $125 by demonstrating that you eased around that corner!

Just creepy.

........

Item Two:

Our son Colby, 25, was recently accepted into the graduate Master of Fine Arts program at the American Film Institute Conservatory in Los Angeles, in the discipline of cinematography. The Conservatory accepts each year 28 new fellows worldwide in each of a handful of disciplines(producing, directing, set design, etc.). The Institute sponsors the well-known AFI annual achievement awards in filmmaking, and boasts all the Hollywood names you ever heard of.

Colby's Conservatory program is the filmmaker's equivalent of, in my world, Harvard Business School on steroids. We have many friends in and around the movie business, and they say this acceptance is HUGE! Congratulations to Colby, who did this without insider connections, or committing to building a new wing; he did it on raw and unadulterated talent, coupled with his fierce determination to succeed.

I and his mother are simply falling-down proud of our son.

What the Heck is Going On Over There?

My prime business associate in Malaysia recently asked me the pertinent business questions to which everyone in the world wants to know the answers: What the Heck is Going On Over There?

Here's what I told him:

Hello Chew,

The questions you ask about the US economy are difficult to answer clearly. The missing buyer demand is not returning quickly, so business cannot grow until the demand increases.

The companies that make consumable products, or that make the goods that carry and package the consumable products, have been liquidating their raw stock inventory for many months whenever any buyer appears. The liquidated raw inventories are not being replaced with new raw inventory, so the demand for industrial goods has been missing also.

This cycle of liquidation is nearly ended, as manufacturers' inventories are very low now, and any new demand cannot be met from inventory - but will require new investment.

Will substantial new demand reappear? This is the major question of 2009 and 2010.

There are two types of US demand - private consumers, and government ("public") demand. Examples of public demand are military orders (guns), public works orders (highways), and public construction orders (courthouse buildings). Private consumer demand covers every conceivable product used by people, and is potentially much larger than government demand. Statistically, consumer demand makes up about 70% of US economic activity.

Government demand would seem to be more secure and predictable, but in fact is the opposite. Regardless of published intent to spend, government contracting is slow, and often payments for goods and services is even slower. Even now, last year's highly publicized government emergency economic support for "shovel-ready" contracts are mostly still tangled up in government bureaucracy.

Consumer demand is different, and better. We have a well-founded belief that the US consumers have lots of pent-up demand, because we see the singular success of the new US government program for trading old cars for new ones with a sizeable government rebate (the program called "cash for clunkers" - funny name, eh?). For the first time since the recession began, the US government has put significant sums of money directly available to consumer buyers - and the consumers have spent the money immediately. The car industry is suddenly very busy, and very happy.

In contrast, the US government program for putting monies into banks to give them lendable funds has been almost totally unsuccessful, because the banks are simply keeping the money in the vaults, and not lending it to the consumers who will buy the goods that run the factories, truckers, packagers, and retailers. One could argue that the banks are the wrong parties to recapitalize the economy because the banks are now overly risk-averse, when the economy needs some element of risk-taking to return to overall health.

So, the current state of the US economy seems to be
- slowing or stopped inventory liquidation
- cautious but still interested consumers
- widespread pent-up demand by consumers
- lack of urgency to buy (prices aren't going up, and might still go down)
- lack of confidence by buyers to make large financial commitments
- unwillingness of the prime sources of consumer liquidity, the banks, to participate in recovery

The return of consumer demand will be influenced heavily by the length of time that goes by while no new economic shocks hit the fragile consumer. Barring any such new economic shocks, we think consumers will come out of their bunkers with purses and wallets open within a matter of three-six months.

When the consumers return, they will discover an inventory outage, with resulting longer wait times than expected. This outage won't last long, as the capacity to fill the inventory pipeline is waiting in the wings to swing into action. One interesting side effect is likely to be the resurgence of domestic US production, rather than overseas production, due to the need for very fast turnaround of orders.

The requirement for producers and their suppliers, then, is to hang on for another six months while demand builds. The requirements for economic facilitators, like banks and government entities, is to keep a steady hand on the wheel - no changing the rules in the middle of the game - in order to inspire a growing confidence in all parties.

The bottom line is that the future must be a foreseeable future, and not simply a throw of the dice. We're getting there, slowly. This is what the stock market tells us by bouncing nicely from the lows of this year to today's much improved values.

Regards/Jim

Gulag Flooring

I sent a letter to my two California Senators a few months ago. Of course, those two Senators have bigger fish to fry than my concerns; bigger fish such as how to keep the seventh largest economy in the world, California, from becoming insolvent. I presume that's why I haven't yet received my response from them, some five months later.

Here's the letter:

I listened on television to President Obama's speech to Congress last night, and can draw inspiration from his words. But there is a problem in my industry that dilutes the potential effectiveness of this national economic recovery program.

I am the CEO of a private corporation in California manufacturing hardwood flooring. I am concerned that during these times of shrinking economic opportunities that our private sector manufacturing company, and our tax-paying citizen-employees must compete directly in the national marketplace not only with foreign imports, but also with U.S. and state-owned or
-sponsored prison enterprises.

Yes, incredible as it may seem, we face in the marketplace every day competition from wood flooring products made in prisons by low-paid prisoners in Tennessee and South Carolina, and maybe other state prisons I don't know about. Large flooring corporations like Armstrong Industries and other smaller competitors capitalize on this source of captive prison labor (pun intended). As a specific example, one of our prominent California manufacturing competitors recently laid off their 75 local taxpaying employees, and sent the work away to, not China, not Vietnam, but to the prison labor force of the Tennessee prison system. When our company loses business transactions, and we've lost plenty of them in recent months, our employees face layoffs, and the resulting loss of their abilities to pay their rent or mortgages, and the loss of their wages being recycled through the economy. When the prison industry managers lose business transactions, the prisoners simply go back to their taxpayer-supplied rooms and wait for their dinners.

When times are good, this prison industry issue is a minor irritation and routinely overlooked. Nowadays, when things are not so good, it's becoming a big deal. It's obviously unfair to private enterprise, struggling or not, even on the face of it. Surely, the original intent of the prison industry was to provide other state-owned purchasing requirements, such as furniture for schools.

This inequity should be simple to fix. I ask you to introduce clarifying federal legislation requiring prison industries to sell prison-produced products only to public entities such as schools. Prison labor should never, especially now, be placed in competition with private sector labor.

Sincerely,

James P. Oliver, CEO
Plantation Hardwood Floors
Oxnard, CA 93030
www.plantationhardwood.com

How 'bout Them Finances!

I was chatting on the phone with an industry colleague the other day. We two are in different aspects of the flooring business - he is a flooring installation contractor, I am a flooring manufacturer.

Beyond dark-humored comments like, "Write if you get work...," the subject turned to the obscure but ever-lurking danger of working, really extending oneself, for a general contractor, a homeowner, or another flooring contractor, and then not getting paid.

In these trying times, we know some commercial firms will disappear into insolvency. Or not disappear - I know a company that is currently severely insolvent, but still lives, zombie-like, from job deposit to job deposit. If the acquisition of job deposits slows or stops, that final deposit from an innocent and trusting client will be forfeited.

If we stay on top of the commercial insolvents' credit reports, we'll presumably know in time to take evasive action. On the other hand, private homeowners tend not to go broke, but sometimes find excuses, usually irrelevant, to withhold payment for work done.

But my colleague and I were thinking of the client who decides, for no apparent reason, simply not to pay his bill. The proferred hypothetical situation is the client who, unknown to anyone, is down to his final project, has no new projects in the pipeline, has spent all the end-users' deposit- and progress payment monies, and has nothing left to pay us with. The financial damage to us could be upwards of 50% of the contract value, or more.

The question then hanging in the air: what can we do to prevent this from happening?

There are several approaches. The favorite: in California, we file preliminary liens against the owners' properties. But what if your state will not allow this?

Then you have to get creative. Some ideas:

• Contract for a payment bond on the suspect client. Offer to pay for the premium, usually about 5% or so. You may find out right then that the client is not bondable, and thus not financially reliable.
• Contract for payment up front, or at least sizeable deposit upfront with balance due before delivery of the goods.
• Contract for interim payments to minimize the outstanding balances due under the contract, and stop work if the interims are not paid.
• Bypass the suspect contract party, and make your deal with the end-user directly. In this scenario, make sure the suspect contract party can reliably be paid his customary and expected project margin - either by the end-user, as is traditional, or by you.

The ultimate answer may be some combination of the above. But the real solution is to know with certainty the financial status and capabilities of your business counter-parties. This admonition applies equally to suppliers, as it applies to clients. A broke supplier has probably mis-spent your deposit money, or fails to deliver against your time-sensitive obligation to your own client. A broke supplier also lacks the capability to respond to a legitimate complaint about quality or performance, or to spend the money to fix a problem.

In these days, if you don't know the financial status of your counter-parties, you can easily come to understand the awful meanings of "uncollectible account receivable," or "inability to timely deliver."

Chill out! It's a Holiday!

I think I need an attitude adjustment.

I call trucking people to discuss picking up a load of flooring...and have to leave a message. I call the raw flooring mill to discuss an order...and have to leave a message. I check my email...it's mostly spam (no, not you Conrad and not you, Sunny). I check my voice messages. All quiet.

Oh yeah. It's a holiday.

Holidays always throw me for a loop. Shouldn't be this way. Holidays are always forecast. Holidays are always on the calendar - in different colors, to boot. Holidays are eagerly anticipated by the vast majority of people, working or not. Holidays mean good things: good food, family around, places to go have fun, time to do nothing. To relax.

Holidays also mean that shipments won't be finished in time. A project will fall behind. Paperwork will accumulate faster than it can be processed. (There's a rule: it takes five full workdays to recover the output missed in one non-work holiday.)

Did someone say, "workaholic?"

I'd hate to think so. But the workload mountain looms all the time - and I cannot see over it. I hear the wolf scratching at the door. I can't look back - because something's gaining on me!

I'd prefer to say "entrepreneur." Doesn't sound so pathological.

Have a happy holiday... (I'll be here chillin' when you all get back to work.)

Ah, weekends...

On this Sunday morning, the muse is gently whispering in my ear. I dare not ignore her (she doesn't like that...). She says quietly that it doesn't matter that probably nobody cares what's on my mind. She says it is more important to write it than evaluate it.

This is the weekend. Weekend days dish up precious time to me. Weekend days are no longer about kids' activities - the kids are grown up now. It's not about camping, or mini-vacations. Weekend days are about the opportunity to turn down the weekday volume. And, amazingly, when the day-to-day volume is turned down, I find there are other tunes playing under there.

How to turn down the volume? For me, it's reading - books, local newspapers, the business press, trade journals, the cereal box. Like cable TV, a mind has multiple channels - and I discovered reading doesn't take up all my channels. Those channels unused in reading are active in their own right. They are carrying the tunes playing beneath the surface.

It's funny. I'll be cruising along on something I want to read, and suddenly, I have the answer to a lingering question or stubborn problem that I wasn't thinking about -I was just reading the newspaper! This backchannel, subsurface thinking is how, for me, problems get solved, situations get analyzed, business ideas are born.

Today, this morning, it was the Wall Street Journal. The backchannel idea? How to develop a flooring product that incorporates a special "green" technology that everybody wants, but nobody provides.

Sorry, that's all you get.

But you can be sure I'll renew my Wall Street Journal subscription. Maybe I'll head down to the library for a new book, so I can get some more great flooring ideas.

Something's Happening Here...What It Is Ain't Exactly Clear...

Yes, something's happening here...in the construction world, and the flooring world. Those of us of a certain vintage remember that Vietnam-era song, mostly addressing the paranoia of the times.

Our little flooring business has gotten busy! And it all happened at once, it seems. Every corner of our national market has perked up, with one exception. Almost as if the logjam broke in all minds at the same time.

Of course, we're thrilled. We are back to making floors and parquets as fast as the lumber and blanks can be trucked in, unloaded, and queued up. Our factory force is back at full strength, and we're carefully calculating lead times in our quotes again. This is exhilarating, and we TRUST it will continue for awhile.

The one exception is Las Vegas. That town is a construction disaster area, after having once been anticipated as the saving grace for commercial construction. Many hotel projects in Las Vegas are nearly finished; and the big one, City Center, seemingly has the financing actually to be completed. But many others, although nearly complete, are shut down for lack of the financial wherewithall to go forward to completion. Strange. To think of all that sunk cost, now inches from the finish line, and someone somehow can't close out the deal.

So, remodelers and new constructors, residentials and commercials, congratulations on getting the resources together to get those projects back off the drawing board and into action. Our architect and designer friends aren't far behind, although those projects take longer to cycle through. Still, our work tables are covered with plans and drawings, construction budgets are being drawn up again, and a cautious enthusiasm is in the air.

Do you feel it too? Give us a shout - what's going on where you are?

The Opening Gambit

Writing a blog will be new to me. Reading a blog may not be new to you. If this blog becomes boring or seems one-dimensional, forgive me. I'll get better at it.

Why engage in this quasi-conversation called "blogging?" Well, for starters, for all the publicized reasons: getting and staying in touch with interested parties in this business enterprise that seems to consume our professional lives; promoting glimpses of new things we're dreaming up; and providing a forum for comments from our customers, resellers, sales reps, company friends, personal acquaintances, old buddies, and (gasp!) competitors.

But there is another reason to engage in this blogging. It's a chance to have a real dialogue with interested and interestING people on the business subjects we attend to every day. Ideas and commentary about matters, large and small, of life in business flow through my brain in what seems like a steady and endless stream. What good is that, really, if it is inadequately shared? So, the experiences of my own decades-long love affair with global business are begging to pour forth here - many experiences in the wood business, including our Plantation custom-made floors, but also many from my years of international business travel, global adventure, and my ongoing looks at our larger world with wide-eyed fascination.

Undoubtedly we'll also spend a lot of blog time on more immediate, day-to-day subjects about hardwood flooring. What goes into making a reasonable flooring buying decision? What are the technical differences between "commodity" flooring, and "good" flooring? How can some flooring cost so little, and other flooring cost so much? I do hope there will be many other questions and answers that you, our gentle readers, will inspire.

Finally, for today, starting up this blog contemplates responses from the people who read it. If you read this thing, please respond. I expect it'll be fun, and we'll all have a good time.