Good News!
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| As regular readers of our newsletter know, this space is usually reserved for a Pup of the Week, a dog ready for adoption. While we do have a dog to show you this week, we would also like to point out a wonderful article about the Bill Foundation - the folks that work so hard to rescue dogs and place them in good homes.
Recently, the Bill Foundation was featured on the Huffington Post! Congratulations to them for continuing to do such great work for dogs.
Click here to read the full article.
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Thought for the Day
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"For the man sound in body and serene of mind there is no such thing as bad weather; every day has its beauty, and storms which whip the blood do but make it pulse more vigorously."
~George Gissing
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New England Grows and a Valuable Marketing Lesson
You know you are getting serious snow when nearly 100 roofs cave in and they close schools in Boston! Such was the case on the first day of the New England Grows Show, so in all honesty, I have to say the show started off with a slim crowd and a whimper. Fortunately the roof at the Convention Center held up, the weather gave us a break on the second and third day, and the crowd showed up, allowing us to wind down the winter show season  with a continuing thread of optimism for spring.
And as usual, I followed my proven trade show mantra: lighten up, work hard and play hard. The more fun you have, the more business you do! Take a cue from our friends at Pride's Corner Farms, who had several of their guys parading around the aisles looking like escapees from a Fruit of the Loom commercial. They brought a smile to everyone's face and no one left the show without a lasting impression of "Goodness Grows", their new line of edible landscape plants. You can click here to see these zany dudes and other highlights from the Boston trip. There are over forty photos, so it may take a moment or two to load.
I must share another experience from the old SNA Show show several years ago, where I learned this valuable lesson about mixing fun with your trade show efforts. A company down the aisle from me had come decked out as tennis players using the theme "Let Us Serve You." Being a tennis nut, this prompted me to bring my mammoth Prince tennis racquet that had been used as a display in a sporting goods store window. I had bought this for my young daughter who was about forty two inches tall then, and the racquet was about a foot taller than her.
I had no intention of using this prop for any marketing purposes; only to cut up a little with the guys down the aisle. As I entered the show hall, I had to walk all the way across the floor to get to my booth. It must have taken me an hour to get there because everyone wanted me to stop so they could swing this huge racquet. At one stop, while waiting for a friend to relinquish the racquet, his boss struck up a conversation and before I knew it, I walked away with a $5,000 order. That was a wake up call for me and thus was borne my philosophy which bears repeating: lighten up, work hard and play hard. Then watch good things start to happen.
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Special Guest Appearance
Although we've seen lots of the actual white stuff this winter that wasn't welcome, we were delighted to see this furry little snowball for a change! Snowball is an albino squirrel who visits our deck from time to time to vie for his share of the birdfeed.
Sometimes we will see him three or four times a week and then he will disappear for months on end. Just when we think we'll never see him again he will reappear, reminding us of the variety and the wonder of Mother Nature. |
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Gizmo & Operation Heroes & Hounds
 We are pleased to introduce you to Gizmo. Besides being great with kids, playful and an all around fun dog, Gizmo is special.
He has been trained through a program called Operation Heroes & Hounds, in which returning veterans, many of whom have PTSD, learn about dog training. The program is great for soldiers because they learn new skills and new ways of approaching things, and it's great for dogs because they become better trained and therefore more likely to be adopted.
If you would like to learn more about Gizmo and his training click here. |
A Puzzle with a Prize 
Why would the owners of this beautiful mansion in this historic southern city have statues of this lowly farm animal on each side of their entrance?
Be the first to email us the correct answer to the following question, and receive $25 OFF your next order.
The question: What well known business do these people own? Click here to submit your answer! |
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