The Fish Bowl

Here is a Transcript of Today’s Video:

Speaker 1: (00:00)
Same cup. Nope. Neither did I three, what do I do? Hi, I’m Javier. Hi, I’m Gretchen. And I’m Melanie from [inaudible]. We missed you last time.

Speaker 2: (00:17)
We did, you know, Snoop did a good, good job sitting in for you, but he was way quiet compared to you.

Speaker 1: (00:23)
Yeah, he didn’t say anything the whole time. I totally missed being here. It’s not really weird. Yeah. I had important things to do, you know, current things to them. Yes.

Speaker 2: (00:31)
Yeah. Yeah. Well, I’m just saying I don’t like it

Speaker 1: (00:33)
When you’re not here. [inaudible] it’s magic.

Speaker 3: (00:40)
Yes, it is. Well, it was another wonderful week. So cheers to that. Cheers. Cheers.

Speaker 1: (00:46)
Cheers.

Speaker 3: (00:48)
Yeah, it was tiring. It was time we had, so we had a lot of deliveries. Um, the guys were kept busy. We were kept busy. You were gone a couple of days. You are like top sales person of the month. This month. You’re on my face.

Speaker 1: (01:07)
Oh no.

Speaker 3: (01:09)
So yeah, so it was a wonderful week, but thank God. It’s thank you to all of you. Oh, we also have, we won business of the year kind of brag a little bit about that.

Speaker 1: (01:17)
That was awesome. That’s right.

Speaker 2: (01:21)
It was very much an honor. Uh, the small business development center here in MSU, a, uh, Trish Livingston is our hero. She’s helped us in so many ways. Just getting through the years and processing, going from sole proprietor to LLC and, and helping us through the COVID months. So she’s just been our strong man up there and we truly appreciate you. [inaudible].

Speaker 3: (01:47)
Thank you. And then this week’s beers are from the Cloudcroft brewery. We’re doing something a little bit different. We’ve got Cloudcroft brewing. We’ve got, um, this one is the steam engine stout. This is a pretty good, pretty good chocolate tasting stout. Yeah. Look at that. That’s a lot of head on that one. Yeah. Yeah. I poured it a little better. I’m a little gentler. She just was like going like gloomy. You doing good?

Speaker 1: (02:12)
Great. So I tried to do that. I think I got that. One’s a little, a little less. I’m so magical. I think if you had this much magic going on, your bear would be that magic.

Speaker 3: (02:22)
That’s there’s a bunch of magic. Yeah. We had a customer that I was like apologizing for the unicorn horn because she had really more of that horn all day long. This is how I Friday. Yeah. This is how she Fridays. And the lady was like, no, we need more people like her.

Speaker 1: (02:37)
I had two customers back to back that were like encouraging of the unicorn. It needs to be

Speaker 3: (02:45)
The unicorn. That’s right.

Speaker 1: (02:47)
Just keep adding to it. It’s a lot. He thought I went and like bought all this for today’s show. And I was like, no, this I, this is an ongoing thing like this. This is like, I mostly have a closet of costumes.

Speaker 4: (03:01)
I have some normal clothes. Oh, there are a lot of people out there that understand

Speaker 3: (03:12)
Theirs. Yeah.

Speaker 2: (03:13)
I’m going to share my beer because I decided to try something else besides stout, because we had two styles and I wanted to represent more of the beers. So I’m drinking the sunset, Amber. It is, it looks like a really good answer. Yeah. And it’s one of those when you drink it at first, it’s very light. And then your beer flavor just really rolls board. It’s so good. Yeah. Our first beer was an Amber. Yes. Hey, this is the way to go. If you like a light beer. It’s good stuff. I mean, it’s kind of a Cummins ending when you look at the coloring of it, but it’s beautiful. It’s actually very yummy, very flavorful. And that can matches your nails. Oh yeah. Oh your Cornell’s right. Right. Okay. So I have this fixation with doing nails now. And so now that I’ve figured out how to do them, I’m getting really loud in options and colors and this and the other, you’re just getting loud on your nails. These right here are definitely mounting

Speaker 4: (04:05)
I’m I’m so getting those done. Yes. I’m on board. Yes. I’m all in. I know I’m behind my house.

Speaker 3: (04:17)
So we’re wearing our beads because it was fat Tuesday this past Tuesday. And we didn’t get to make, we didn’t get to make any fun videos because why didn’t we make a fun video? I think we were busier than heck. Huh? We’ve been really busy this week.

Speaker 4: (04:29)
Tuesday, Tuesdays are busy. Yeah. But we wanted to show our support for Mardi Gras in Louisiana because this year and last year to Mardi Gras was really affected. Um, I did live in Louisiana for a little bit of my lifetime and um, I have been to Mardi Gras and I know the importance of it for the local economy and local businesses and you know, and the pride of, uh, of Mardi Gras for that state and area. So yeah, what I think was really cool was what I shared with you guys, uh, was, you know, instead of being able to,

Speaker 3: (05:04)
Oh, the houses. Yes. Yeah. They did house floats. Yeah. You got to see it right

Speaker 2: (05:09)
On the news. Yeah. They have an, uh, Mike, Mel says, you know, like it’s their billion dollar year making event. It’s a huge event.

Speaker 3: (05:17)
They lost hundreds of millions of dollars over the past two years. So yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2: (05:21)
And just what that one event, I mean, they raise over a billion dollars every year and what Mel’s talking about, as far as them having their houses decorated by it floats it’s people walk down the sidewalk so they can stay mass, stay apart from each other and still be able to appreciate the artists, which they did raise money to pay, to come and do these things. So they are still raising money, but

Speaker 4: (05:43)
Got things going on and the food, I mean the, the sounds, I mean, it’s, it’s incredible. Yeah. We want to go one time.

Speaker 3: (05:50)
Yeah. It’s on the bucket list. It’s definitely on the bucket list. Well, okay. So fishbowl, as you guys know, this is where we wind down our week. We unwind from our week and we actually, we used to do this alone and I mean in the office and just kind of talk to each other and kind of spin, spin. What was that? Whatever was asked of us. And now we share it with you as we drink beer, same as we always do. And, um, we kind of just go through the questions and whatever research we’ve done. And then we are implementing a new, fun thing. That was a hit when we did it two weeks ago. Um, we did our bloopers. Cause as you guys know, we do a lot of videos, a lot of videos. And so we put our bloopers in a while. We put the blooper of Mel having a little accident over there in the boutique and the people commented on that. So we’re going to go ahead and put that at the end of these videos. And what we’ll do is we’ll add our bloopers from our funniest parts from this past week onto the end of this video. And we’ll do that as obsession of this. So now it’ll be questions, it’ll be what we learned. And then it’ll be the bloopers of the week

Speaker 1: (07:02)
And have the areas that we forgot the week. So you gotta

Speaker 3: (07:04)
Watch. Yeah, we’ve got, I’ve got some good bloopers and then she had, she had an yeah, she had an interesting one.

Speaker 1: (07:11)
Well, I also, yes, there was definitely a blooper this week, but you missed a very important part of the introduction, which is the crazy introductions. There’s always something interesting to the Internet’s it provided by an watt. Yes. Which is our blame. She has brought us and we didn’t have to show anything to get these beads now, which is super nice. Yep. These beads were actually a gift to me from Bob and Becky Coulter. So thank you, Bob. [inaudible] dang it. I should’ve made up a story for that. Oh wow. This is, think about what Bob and Becky had to do for this stuff. It’s like 20 more pounds back there. It’s a huge bag. So some good bang here. All I got to say is it took me back to childhood years and I want to sit here and go. I pity the fool. If you guys know Mr. T I grew up with Mr. T on TV and now I feel like Mr. T I got the blame. I need the Mohawk. I like this van. Yes. Well, the van is a huge part of his blank. You can’t be Mr. T without the van. That’s perfect.

Speaker 3: (08:24)
So first question, I’ve heard you say on a video that you sell flex a bed medical basis, what do those do? That your normal basis? Don’t so this one, this one is kind of a strange one for us. Um, we are a signed to vendor forum. You guys, you guys have seen the catalog, right? No. Okay. All

Speaker 1: (08:48)
Right. So I will,

Speaker 3: (08:50)
I will handle this one. So yeah. So I’m on a video. Yes. On a video several months ago, I talked about carrying flexible because I carried flex a bed for a, uh, there was, there was one customer that just had to have it and she couldn’t find it anywhere. So I signed up with the vendor and we bought, we bought a flexor bed for her. And what this does is it’s a adjustable base and this is completely different from a regular adjustable basis. It goes up to a normal bed height, but it goes down, it adjusted down to whatever bed height you want it at. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s exactly what it’s for right now. You’re remembering it now you’re remembering it. So this thing goes up from a, I believe the minimal height, zero clearance. So it goes all the way down. So the height of your bed.

Speaker 3: (09:42)
So the height of the bed that we sold her was an 11 inch bed. So it went down to 11 inches and then it goes up to the height of 23, 24 inches, which is your basic bed height. This thing also did the basic head up and foot up there was amazing, um, heavier than all be. Um, that is, that’s really the reason why we haven’t gotten big into it because we’re still having to figure that one out because that required a lot of muscle. And, and we’re still developing that part, Mr. Kimo. So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They’re needed, but yeah. So yes, we are in flexible dealer. Yes. We can order whatever you want. We don’t have it quite nailed down yet. As far as it being like one of our yay, big videos, whatever, we don’t have it that far nailed down, but we can get them for you. Well, we’ll update you with a new item video when we do okay.

Speaker 5: (10:44)
That’s all right. All right.

Speaker 3: (10:46)
Well, how do you guys feel about a base like that? I know you said for wheelchair patients,

Speaker 2: (10:50)
I’m personally affected by that. So I love it. My mother is wheelchair bound. So what a great option. Um, and we have sold to quite a few patients that happen to be, and I’m going to say patient just because it’s a medical situation, right. Um, that do have wheelchairs, and it’s a hard thing for them to find something they can transfer from, from their chair to a bed. And most of them do require a transfer board. Um, so with that leveling where you can bring it up and down, it’s no longer about how can we lower the power base and the mattress and everything involved, um, to match the level of the transfer board. So that is genius. I love this thought. It was pretty cool. Yeah. That’s pretty cool.

Speaker 5: (11:33)
I think it’s really important to like for instance, John’s mom is very little, she’s a little gal and I’ve met, uh, several mamas that are they’re they’re little biddies. Um, not that John’s mom is a little bitty yet, but very short. And I think that crawling into a big, huge mattress or up on the bed,

Speaker 4: (11:54)
You know, having the ability to lower your bed or adjust your bed depending on what you need for those circumstances. Yeah. Cause people are, you know, all different sizes, really tall.

Speaker 3: (12:05)
Yeah. When I saw this, I thought it was genius, but we ran into the hiccup of on delivery. It took three guys to deliver this thing because it gives it seriously a lot of metal. Well, you got to figure it’s on scissors. So it was on scissors and their coverage scissors, very, very interesting design and to raise up and down and it was, it was seriously super heavy. There was a lot of metal. Um, it was, it looked just like one of our premium basis. I mean, this thing was pretty, it was really pretty. And you couldn’t tell it was a medical device, but I’m telling you if it’s worthwhile, we just got to figure out that last little bit of delivery.

Speaker 2: (12:44)
Well, I tell you for people that still want independence in mail home, this is a great option. It really is.

Speaker 3: (12:51)
Yeah, definitely. Okay. So moving on to another question, did you put any fun ones in here this week?

Speaker 2: (12:58)
Um, am I saying what I put in there?

Speaker 3: (13:02)
Okay. Ooh. How much of what you sell is made in the USA?

Speaker 2: (13:10)
Well, how do you know what percentage, I mean, as far as the mattresses, just about all of them, almost all of our mattresses are made in the USA. Um,

Speaker 3: (13:20)
There’s one, that’s not, yes.

Speaker 2: (13:22)
Yeah. But I don’t know as far as like our furniture, I don’t think, I think that comes from Vietnam and the United States. And then we have multiple products in the boutique don’t even get started there. We have thousands of things in the boutique. So it would be really hard to dissect that question.

Speaker 4: (13:46)
That’s an interesting question. And that question is very pertinent to the times that we live in right now. I think that that question would not have come up. Um, you know, a couple of years ago, you know, pre COVID 19, I think consumers right now are very, they’re they’re really considering where are goods produced? Um, I think it’s been very opening, um, for a lot of different reasons. You know, I think we, you know, aside from political reasons, I think that we could look at, um, the chain of distribution and how products get to us. Um, you know, I mean, it, it, it spans the globe. There are political reasons for some individuals, there are reasons for distribution on the availability of the product. Um, I even have had customers, uh, concerned with, uh, warranty issues, manufacturing parts, right. But I am seeing a lot of our customers coming in and when we are able to sell them a bed that is made by Sutherland and it’s made in the U S and that the steel that is incorporated into that bedding is smelted and made into the steel.

Speaker 4: (14:49)
There’s a lot of pride there. Um, they’re like sold, you know, they, they really want to bring back manufacturing to our country. Um, I think some of our linens and some of our pillows, you know, they are made overseas, but the ones that are made overseas, um, or even in possibly China, those have been Serta pure Serta curious certifies. So they’re not going to offgassing from aldehydes or toxic chemicals. Um, and for instance, Maloofs, um, I think the most important thing to consider with Maloof is that they are changing some of their manufacturing from China. But even though it says China on there, what I really want people to pay attention to is that it’s part of the Mulloon foundation and a part of your, uh, when you purchase a Maloof product, a part of your purchase goes to the Maloo foundation. And that is a global network that is giving money to support, um, safe housing, children and adults that are victims of sex trafficking. And also the judicial process of that, of bringing justice to those victims and the individuals involved in that. So you, you may be purchasing a product from China, but you’re also supporting a much greater business, which is US-based. So don’t forget that when you purchase those products, you’re still supporting a us company. They just happen to have some of their manufacturing need overseas, but they’re doing good work pink.

Speaker 3: (16:18)
So I can answer the question because I get asked that question a lot too. So the mattresses I already told you, one is made in China, okay. The furniture, and God knows, we try to get a lot of American made furniture of the furniture we are still at about 75% made out of the States. 25% made in the space. We are planning to change that, but COVID has made it quite interesting, many difficult from logging to smelting, to, um, foam supplies. Everything has gotten harder this year and be American manufacturing. Um, they fell behind, they fell months behind. And so they’re trying to catch up, they’re doing a darn good job of it, but, um, it’s still going to be a little bit before we get to, uh, my goal, my goal for us. And I haven’t discussed this because it’s, it’s something that I’m just inside of me. I would really like to see us at a 60, 40, 60 U S 40 China or outside. And that would be a really nice way of doing it just because it’s so hard to find American based manufacturing that we can all afford. And that, that would that be key for you guys? I mean, that, that that’s key, right? I mean, it has to be something we can all afford because sure. We can find any American manufacturer, but Holy cow, there’s some really expensive American manufacturing.

Speaker 4: (17:47)
It’s expensive manufacturing takes. It’s just plain and simple. It’s becoming expensive to find furniture. I mean, even if you go to a thrift store, the prices at thrift stores have increased due to demand. I mean, across the board, we’re seeing changes.

Speaker 3: (18:03)
So your unicorn stuff’s getting more expensive.

Speaker 4: (18:07)
Like I said before, I’ve had this for a long time, the magic.

Speaker 3: (18:13)
Oh, excuse me. Okay. Going on to the next question. All right. So next question. What is better for an apartment? A sectional or a sofa loveseat. What do you sell? More of? Which one? Who, who wants this? Who wants this? Oh, wait you answer first. The unicorn gets this one

Speaker 4: (18:40)
Again. How big is your apartment?

Speaker 3: (18:44)
Fair enough.

Speaker 4: (18:45)
Um, and storage availability. What do you mean by that? I would mean, does it include some storage? We have some sectionals that include storage. Oh yeah. You’re here. I know what you’re talking about in storage where you can hide stuff like you, for instance, I have hidden in there before. Yeah. Perfect. You can just crawl in there. You can hide anything in there. You know, blankets, unicorns,

Speaker 3: (19:13)
Get some unicorns in storage up the sectional. Alrighty.

Speaker 4: (19:19)
Yeah, that’s right. What’s your answer for that?

Speaker 2: (19:22)
Um, well, my experience of when I lived in an apartment years ago, um, usually the apartment sizes are smaller to the point where you’re very limited. Um, the apartment I lived in, I could fit a love seat and a S and a recliner chair, literally. That was it. Um, but the designs that they have, like Melanie was saying with some of the sectionals are actually meant to be three seated. One side will be a chase, then you’ll have a metal cushion and then you’ll have a right cushion. So with that, it does offer you a counter seating as well as storage, like she was saying in the actual chase lounge, but it also has the availability of pulling out into a bed. So it’s like a guest bed. Um, the thing that I had when I was in my apartment though, is not just the limitation to where you can set the furniture with the size of that furniture, but a walking space in between all of it in the process. So it really depends, like Mel said on the way it’s set up, if your apartment gives you at least two walls to build on, you can pretty much choose whichever one you want. Um, whether it’s a sectional or a, a Lepsy, but if it’s not too walled, then you have to get creative.

Speaker 3: (20:36)
So I’m going to answer this from the Carlsbad point of view, because in Carlsbad, we had to, we definitely have that divider line where we have regular size sofas, and then we have the apartment couches and the apartment sectionals. Do you remember? You’ve seen them well, yeah, you’ve been over. Yeah. Yeah. So we have, we have super small sectionals. We have, um, we’ve had to, to adapt to the Carlsbad area because a lot of the people that were buying at that point were buying for smaller rental homes or smaller apartments. So we had to adapt, um, we still have big furniture there, but there’s a certain section of smaller stuff. And it’s, it’s funny to see them next to each other because you really don’t realize that there’s two different sizes of furniture, but there’s definitely two sides of the furniture. Um, and, and we, we don’t specialize in one particular size we’re, we’re here to take them all on and we have the experience with both of them.

Speaker 4: (21:35)
And I think that’s really important to mention, because for instance, my mother recently purchased an online chair. Um, it was cute. It was, you know, and the picture just looked like it was going to be perfect. Um, and she ordered it online without seeing it in person and being able to sit on it because online ordering is becoming so popular. Um, but it looked like it was going to fit. It looked like it would fit her decor and when it arrived, um, and she put it together, it was so tiny. It was like miniature. And so like, all of her loves it. Like it’s perfect. Oliver’s size. Like, I mean, he’ll be six on June, 15th time flies. And so, I mean, it’s kind of like this chair, but it’s supposed to be like, like, you know, a regular chair and, um, yeah, my mom has got a special order in with us because I was like, mom, what happened to your chair? And I was like, did it look bigger online? And she goes, Oh yeah, she was so disappointed when it arrived. And she spent a lot of money on it, a lot of money for that quality of tear, that type of tear. And you should have just, I mean, it was a look of total disappointment, so you don’t want it to have that happen.

Speaker 3: (22:56)
Skip a question. Cause I want to stay on that subject because this came up. Okay. A lot of people are buying online and we had a customer that bought furniture online and dealt with you. And so we want to tell you that when you buy furniture from us online, we have our phone number and everything on there, and we have ways of you messaging us. But can you tell us how, how you solved that issue? Where what, what happened? This is like a built-in commercial, but it’s pretty important.

Speaker 2: (23:29)
Okay. So whenever you run into issues from ordering online, um, as far as tips, I’ll just say, tip number one is one, research it to find out the company information, um, find out the specs of the couches so that you can get the information to how it’s built, um, as well as reviews, but measure it. That is key. Um, secondly, if you order online, understand that you’re not going to know what it feels like. You’re going to have to trust the write-up that’s given with that product. Um, we have had people that come in that when they sit in a couch that made beautiful for it, when they sit on it, it may not be the field that they’re wanting. Um, so the design of the couch is not going to tell you how it feels. So you’re going to want to sit in it and see how it feels.

Speaker 2: (24:15)
If it’s a certain failure looking for, um, as far as helping the customer, the key is having them try it. Um, it’s no different than with our mattresses when they come in, if they can try something similar to what it is. So if they’re looking for a sofa loveseat, and we happen to have a recliner, that’s what I did had them sit in the recliner to the matching sofa loveseat. Then eight still allows them to have the feel. They can feel the quality of it. They know the quality of it. They have the chance to actually inspect it, see the size, the bowl, the flop, the field. I mean, everything is incorporated in that flying blindly is not always a bad experience, but for those in rabbit had it, I mean, most of the time we don’t have the money to expand on these options and risk it. Um, especially after COVID, I mean, you’re wanting something that’s going to last. So coming in and actually researching product, those would be the two things that I would suggest before buying.

Speaker 4: (25:13)
Absolutely. And I think that, you know, you can really get stuck in a precarious situation if you don’t like the item and how do you return it, because then you’re liable for shipping costs. It’s huge. It’s a big item. How are you going to return it? Then you end up trying to sell it for yourself online and you know, some of the options there, um, and you, it becomes a whole kind of nightmare in itself and a buyer’s regret. Um, so please remember that we’re like a reference library. We even have a computer set up in the middle of our store where you’re welcome to sit down. Um, any of us can sit down with you, we’ll go through the websites, we’ll put on the filters. Uh, you can give us suggestions and we’ll write those down, you know, color type. And we can see, you know, you may not feel comfortable doing that or, you know, it may be overwhelming to you, but we can sit down and take the time during our day when it’s a little bit slow and, and look for a product and give you some options.

Speaker 4: (26:17)
The other thing is that you may pick out an item and it could be delayed with shipping because of COVID-19 you may be looking out at, you know, six months out because it’s back-ordered, or it’s stuck in the ocean and the container that’s listing and falling into the ocean. I mean, there’s all kinds of crazy things like in 2020, and now 2021 is not looking much different. I don’t know. I, the first week was like, cool. Yeah. And then now it’s like, wow. You know, so focus, focus, I’m sorry. My 2021 is like, um, yeah. So there are so many different reasons for you to come into store, sit down with us. And we are a reference library. You can say, Hey, I liked that. I had a woman today that really liked this June apparel, but she wanted it to seat eight and not four. So she wanted a giant June apparel that’s there. Right. We’re going to find out that square too, so we can find it for you.

Speaker 3: (27:17)
Yeah. So I’m going to take the, I’m going to take a different route from what they took, where they’re, where they’re right. I mean, it’s harder to shop online than it is to be in the store, but the way that I’m looking at us as like a hybrid of being able to be online and in the store, what I really look at is that we’ve made ourselves available with the phone calls, with the text messaging, and we also have availability to actually play video or pop you on video and be able to walk you through the furniture on video. So we are, we were definitely a hybrid. Um, I like what you said about being a reference library. That’s, that’s actually pretty, that’s pretty true. That’s really true. Um,

Speaker 4: (28:06)
Because most of our books, we don’t just have the online stuff. So if you’re not really into the technology and you want to look in a book and flip through that, we got that too.

Speaker 3: (28:14)
Yeah. I think, I think that’s a really good approach, but yeah. I mean, if you are shopping online, yes, they’re right. There, there is fear and not getting the right stuff. Don’t have that fear with us, pick up the phone or text us. Our website has that little texting where you can just text us. And, um, during the day she picks it up, you pick it up, I pick it up and we’re on it almost immediately because all of us have it on our computers and we have it on our phones as well. So we’re here for you and we can definitely walk you through any kind of sale.

Speaker 4: (28:48)
Yep. And there’s no rush and there’s no pressure here. So we have customers that come in and they might be here for an hour or longer. Yeah,

Speaker 3: (28:56)
Yeah, yeah. We’re, we’re built to take you like that. So that’s kind of the way that we built this is we want to be able to help you. Okay. All right. So next question. I didn’t even think about it. I should’ve dug around. Okay. This is, this is totally,

Speaker 1: (29:13)
I don’t know how much time did you guys work on social media? It seems like you’re always posting. Okay. So working on social media is pretty much a must are communicating to you is to share what did we learn? Um, I know we say it all the time. We like to read, we like to research. We like to make sure that we have information so that can inform you. So you’re an informed buyer. Um, in the process of that posting, what we learn is just as important. So for us with COVID, we kind of push it a little further because we want you to have the information, but we also want you to know us. We’re humans. We’re fun. We like to share our, our unicorns. We like to share our personalities in a way that actually brings our team to life. We’re not the static computer.

Speaker 1: (30:07)
Just hello, welcome to live. Well, we are, Hey, welcome to live well. So the difference is we just want to be part of you. Um, we want you to be able to relate to us when you read the articles, we want to be able to relate to us when you walk in the door after reading an article, um, because we’re putting it there for you. And you’re the reason. So for us to say, um, anything besides where I’m in social media a lot would be a lie. We are, we are on social media a lot. We really want to be in the know. We really want to be answering questions. We want to be fulfilling needs. And the only way we know it is by communicating with our team and with our customers. So therefore we share a lot. Yeah.

Speaker 4: (30:50)
I had a customer who has become a friend because it happens a lot in our business, right? Yes. And she was, uh,

Speaker 3: (30:56)
Amanda, she’s become a friend. She’s become a friend

Speaker 4: (30:59)
Latina. Um, and she’d sent me a message and you know, and I’m, and it’s on messenger Facebook. And she had, uh, sent me a little request about sheets and I’m answering, set up some of that. And then she goes, wait, I thought you were at home. And I’m like, Oh no girl. I’m at the store. I live here pretty much. And she’s like, Oh, dang. You’re there all day. And I was like, yeah, come on in. So she thought, because I was using Facebook messenger that I was at home and she was going to wait until I came, like came back to work. And then as soon as she realized that I was responding on Facebook messenger from work and doing work at the same time, she was like, I am coming over. So she did, she came over and it was awesome. And, um, so yeah, we have that availability and flexibility in our work day to day to keep like open communication. And, um, it’s really important because it’s really kind of the wave of the future is that, and I really think that that’s more of a way of communicating than actual phone calls anymore.

Speaker 3: (32:00)
Oh yeah. Definitely. Definitely. I think it starts to come to face. Yeah. Yeah. So I, with me with the social media thing, I tell, I tell everybody we’re kind of, we are a media company that happens to sell mattresses furnishings and has a boutique, but we are a media company. And then we have a unicorn. Yes. Thank you. But no, thank you. But we are, we’re a media company that just happens to sell mattresses furnishings and we happen to sell things, but mostly we are a media company because we to communicate with you, um, where we don’t do the news, but we do do the newest things. We do do the newest research and we share that info and yes, we do post a lot and yes, it’s, it’s uh, interesting to see what these guys put out.

Speaker 1: (32:58)
The more you have the opportunity of seeing all of our faces, because we all like to, it’s funny because when someone comes in, we all appear on the floor at some point, like all of us, because we want to get to know people as they come in the door as well. And once we’ve established that communication with you through the computer, we don’t stop like day before yesterday. It’s funny. I, or was it yesterday? I think it was yesterday. I reached out to one of our customers about one of our candles. And then today her daughter popped up.

Speaker 3: (33:29)
Yeah. She said the timing was right there. Yeah.

Speaker 1: (33:31)
And it was just, it was just one of those things. I just happened to be thinking about her when I was out there. And I looked at the candle and was like, this is her favorite. I’m going to message her. And I messaged her. She had just been thinking about getting candles and was talking with her daughter and her daughter’s like, Hey, it’s meant to be. So her daughter came in today to do the shopping for the bowls on him.

Speaker 4: (33:52)
Yeah. We had two customers today back to back that came in because they had been watching the fishbowl. I kid you, not one of them had I wasn’t here last week. So it was just snoot my fill-in right. My, my double. And um, she goes, you weren’t in it. I was like, Oh, Snoop went. So, so she came in after seeing that video again. And, um, and the other customer had also been following us on Facebook. So it’s becoming more and more common free to watch us here. And then you walk in the door and we really appreciate that feedback. And yeah, we’d love to continue the conversation and uh, whatever input you have. And it’s really nice to know that you’re there out there and you’re listening and then you’d come in and see us. So you’re all invited these consents

Speaker 3: (34:40)
As much as we’re pushing out. We’re actually trying to soak in when you come to the door. I mean that, that’s the honest truth. We hang on every word that you tell us. I mean, literally hanging on every word that you tell us. I love like when she’s got hurt, her customers become her friends because she’s a weirdo and they have no choice.

Speaker 4: (35:00)
I’m not a weirdo.

Speaker 3: (35:03)
You guys, what you guys will see when you guys will see is me coming out of the office and just hanging out about 20 feet away. But I’m listening. Then I’m like, okay, what’s some weirdo telling them.

Speaker 1: (35:14)
And then there’s me in the office printing, stop being nosy, right?

Speaker 4: (35:17)
Number one rule of entrepreneurism. And it is always, this is see what your competition is doing and do the opposite. And that’s how I live my life. We’re definitely doing the opposite of what everyone else is doing. Alrighty. And

Speaker 3: (35:38)
Yes, I do give her a hard time, but we all love milk. We all love each other here. We’re we’re just, we’re just a good team. We’re just a good thing. All right. Last question of the night.

Speaker 1: (35:48)
Wait, we’re supposed to go into intermission

Speaker 3: (35:51)
Afterwards.

Speaker 1: (35:52)
Oh yeah. That’s right. Yeah.

Speaker 3: (35:55)
So what are the pluses and drawbacks of a power living room set?

Speaker 1: (36:01)
Oh, I got so many stories that

Speaker 3: (36:07)
Here’s the deal we’re going to, we’re going to take this because I know she’s gonna attack it, attack it. I can extend, I am pro power. She is not now. And you are,

Speaker 1: (36:21)
I’ve never been able to afford power at my house.

Speaker 3: (36:24)
So we’re, we’ve got a neutral. So we have

Speaker 1: (36:28)
Few times I’m just coming out of my futon stage and into my

Speaker 3: (36:33)
Aw, that’s so cute. Okay. So that’s how we’re going to play this negative. Positive, neutral. Okay.

Speaker 1: (36:44)
No negative, but my experience is negative. Okay. Go ahead. Okay. So we had this amazing leather couch that hobby brought home and was our favorite. Okay. So anytime somebody would come to the door, ring the doorbell, you’re like bringing down the chair of a chair. They’re looking at you from a window and it’s still coming down, coming down, coming down, then you get up. And by the time you get there, they’re ready to walk away. That’s an issue for me

Speaker 3: (37:20)
Was an older one to, in, in, in, in power couches, defense. That was an older one. Keep going.

Speaker 1: (37:25)
Sorry. Okay. Another thing is, is if you have to go to the bathroom and you’re watching a show and somebody who holds a remote, wait till the last minute, and then they hit pause. You got to like jump up real quick again. Wait, that is annoying. I don’t have the patience for that. If somebody has an accident and they spill something. Cause you know, kids wait for it. If your dog goes through the back door and scratches to go to the bathroom, wait for her.

Speaker 3: (37:55)
And again, an older couch now. Okay. All right. So, so that was yours. Okay. Okay. That you had the minuses, you said, you said pluses and minuses. Okay. All right.

Speaker 1: (38:07)
And that’s mamas that have birth kids. Yeah. You’ll know exactly what I’m saying. When you have to pee, you have to go. There’s no go. Yeah, that’s right. There’s no time to wait for it. And he’s it for that. And not only that your situation, whenever you have like multiple animals and stuff on you, this have any other [inaudible]. Oh, I love my babies. Okay. So with that, it’s like you have one in your lap. The other one wants to come in again with it and then they can get in. Yeah. It’s just to me, it’s an annoyance. I want the chair to go down when I want it down. And I wanted to go up when I got up. And if I have to use a little muscle to do it, to kick that chair and as I stand up, you know what, I’m still using some muscle. That’s good. So, um, I’m down for the whole handle pulling out. Okay.

Speaker 4: (39:00)
All right. All right. Your turn.

Speaker 3: (39:02)
Nope. Well, do we go negative? Do we go negative, neutral then positive. Okay.

Speaker 4: (39:08)
Okay. Well I know that it impacted sale recently. Yes. I lost a sale with some friends, originally customers to become customers that will they work? Sorry. I got that backwards again. It’s the beer. Yeah. Definitely friends were originally customers and then some dots got connected and it’s like, wow. What a small world. Wonderful people. Yes. Hello. And, um, so Kathy was like, Hey, I really love this couch. And they’ve been waiting for six months.

Speaker 3: (39:41)
They’ve been waiting a while. Cause these were special order

Speaker 4: (39:44)
And um, wonderful folks and so ready to buy. What about that night? And we’re talking some really nice couches here. Yeah. So, but because of that reason and she’s a go getter and she goes, goes and goes and goes and she is not somebody to stay still for very long. And um, I think her husband was like cool and chill with it, but not Kathy. Kathy was like, no, I am not one of those people. And she needed that option to like quick release. Like I want it down so I can go. Same thing. It impacted my sales this month. So I know the number one.

Speaker 3: (40:29)
So here’s, here’s the rundown of it. A power, power self to set a power living room set is quite a bit different from the handle release. Okay. Yes. On the handle release, you can plop it down as fast as your little legs can go on a power set. They tend to be a higher end set that will do a full lay down in tends to be a wall hugger. It tends to be a much more well-built and you can put it right up next to your wall and it’ll recline and it’ll pull you away from the wall, but not so far that you can’t get to your, to your table. So they tend to be a higher end. They tend to be much better construction and they tend to last you longer. That was the pluses, the minuses there, they are slower, not as slow as she’s saying, because the one that we had was older, but they were slow work. They’re slow word. They might take were going like this with your legs. Exactly flu. Now we’re doing, we’re doing this with your legs and just kind of snapping down to the chair might take a minute. I mean, my minute might take a couple seconds or maybe a second. The, um, the power, the power sofa will take about five seconds to reclaim. I mean, we’re not talking like a full minute. We’re talking in five seconds. He goes through. Okay. So it’s not that bad, but it is, it takes so much adjusting.

Speaker 4: (42:12)
It’s a good time to enter the Zinn enters in through that moment. So like, as you’re pushing the button, that’s when you breathe,

Speaker 1: (42:20)
I go to the bathroom. [inaudible] when it comes to waters. I definitely love that aspect of it. I have to say that because when you’re right up against a wall, you don’t have to centralize your couches and stuff. When they reclined they’d actually scoop forward so I can walk all the way down and then it comes back up on the power, besides that.

Speaker 4: (42:45)
Okay. Now there have been times when John and I have gotten stuck in our, um, big recliner. Well, yeah,

Speaker 1: (42:52)
[inaudible],

Speaker 4: (42:55)
It’s kind of holding out until the, like the big day. And like when you make the big steps of like coat coexisting in the same place. Yeah. So that’s going to be a big step for us as she’s still married. Yeah, pretty much. And like, like

Speaker 3: (43:11)
He John’s going, like, I just hadn’t bought a couch because I didn’t need one yet.

Speaker 1: (43:19)
We’re home

Speaker 4: (43:19)
Off. I think. I don’t know. [inaudible]

Speaker 1: (43:27)
He’s

Speaker 4: (43:27)
Not here today, but Oh my goodness. Okay. So, so like sometimes we squish on one, um, recliner and we have a couple of times and like read, we try to get up, you know, it’s kinda like, ah, ah, weekend.

Speaker 3: (43:45)
They’re not made for two people,

Speaker 4: (43:47)
Like one and we’re like stuck in between the arms. We’re trying to make an alum seat. Yeah.

Speaker 1: (43:52)
You need to make that big man.

Speaker 4: (43:57)
Yeah. It’s very uncomfortable. And um, all I can say is that I do not recommend anyone sitting on that’s what part? Because that happened. And he sat on the foot part and I was up here.

Speaker 1: (44:17)
She got launched,

Speaker 4: (44:19)
Like it gave away and this was Christmas night and he, he was sitting on it and talking to me and then it gave way. And I, it totally launched me into his forehead.

Speaker 1: (44:32)
I almost got knocked out. It was like, I thought I had a concussion because our foreheads boom. So I do not recommend, you know, that, you know?

Speaker 3: (44:43)
Yeah. Say people, this isn’t important for you to say,

Speaker 1: (44:47)
For example, dangerous, absolutely dangerous. And there are times when we have the, you know, we have the manual and it’s like, you get stuck in it. And you’re like pushing with your feet. Yeah. And if you’re small and petite, you can get stuck in those. And it’s like, I gotta get out. I got to get out. When you came out. No is lean forward. Then you kick like your own emotion of standing up. So if you can lean forward at the same time,

Speaker 3: (45:16)
This is me. This is me, baby. Just press the button.

Speaker 1: (45:21)
Okay. Let me tell you, if you live in Texas right now, your power recliner would not be one point and you wouldn’t have been able to enjoy any room in there. Do you feel stuck in, well, you could get stuck in the out position. You could get stuck, period.

Speaker 3: (45:37)
Okay. We’re going to go to intermission before this goes further. We’ll see you guys in a couple seconds. Bye. And we’re back. And our intermissions are actually excuses for bathroom breaks and beer refills and Kenyans. Yes. Lots of Funyuns. So that’s what our intermissions of what I wanted to do.

Speaker 1: (46:00)
They do the intermission. Can we like stop and start over? Cause I thought it would be really funny to come back and have a lot of beads, like extra beats. You have enough peace, certainly beads. It makes me go, Oh my God, I am so hot right now. [inaudible] it’s like, Whoa, okay. This is going to take some skills because I have a horn. And I know that I’m really hot. And this underlayer is this horn. It’s magic much better. All right. C Oh, show him your tail. Oh yeah. And I can show you, how does this relate to what we learned? Well, I learned that I’m still getting hot at the end of February. Oh, players are still your kid.

Speaker 3: (46:58)
Okay. So this is a, what we learned this week section, where we learn, where we take, what we learned and share it with you and not sitting on our tail. So Gretchen, what did you learn this week?

Speaker 1: (47:10)
Um, okay. So I have had a week full of a lot of read type research and communicate on the computer. Um, so with me, I would have to say relations with other vendors because with the boutique, I’m always growing it. And when people come in and tell, Hey, do you have this? If I don’t. That gives me very interested. Matter of fact, today, I had a gentleman who came into the boutique and asked for a second specific that we don’t have yet, but we’re going to have soon because gentlemen, we have men coming in here all the time, that shop for their women.

Speaker 5: (47:42)
So big time gift certificates,

Speaker 1: (47:45)
Just certificates are a great way. But with that, it gives me red flags that, Oh, we don’t have it. So I turn around and start researching vendors. So I have a couple of vendors. Well, actually three that I’ve been working with all week on trying to bring in. So we’re going to hopefully be expanding again. Sorry. The beers making the paper.

Speaker 5: (48:06)
Is it really loud because of my Frenching is really loud in my head. I can’t.

Speaker 3: (48:11)
No, no, it’s not that loud. Okay. So anyways, so okay. Her, her what we learned. Yeah. She’s going to be bad when she gets them. She has hasn’t for hours. So, so what I learned this week was number one, there are a lot of gentlemen that come to the boutique. Number two, she has some really cool stuff coming. Um, really cool stuff that she’s been working on all week long. I cannot wait to do the new item videos on those skills. They’re going to be so much fun. Yeah. The other thing I learned is that never leave Melanie alone to do a video on her own because she will literally do this masterpiece where there’s cutaway this and cutaway that, and I need to use the first three seconds here and use my voice only here. Yeah. Like we had all of her stone. We have an Oliver stone couldn’t production coming on this week’s new item. So this week’s new item be on the lookout for this girl. This girl can direct produce and act like it was professional. So I spent literally, I would say what two and a half hours cutting a stupid three minute video.

Speaker 5: (49:23)
I didn’t hear that at all. But there was a lot of cuts and I had to sit there and be like, okay, and this is what I was thinking. And then I’m supposed to, you’re supposed to transition, slow it down. Like, no, like 70% now 60%. Oh wait, I like it. That 80, there was a lot of details. And then I did get a lot of comments that I’m a little bit toned down.

Speaker 3: (49:41)
Yes. Yeah. Well it’s okay. Just wait till you see it this week on Wednesday, new item videos come out every Wednesday, this week’s new on a video. She took production to a whole nother level and yeah. Yeah. And I quite frankly, I think I deserve an award for the editing on this, so yes, yes. Yeah. So the other thing I learned this week was I had my appointment and you guys will hear about it on, on sleep coach, but I had my appointment for my sleep study. So my sleep study is on May 2nd. Um, I learned a lot from that appointment. Um, they, they actually measure your neck and measure the opening of your, of your airway. They measure so much state, lots of cool little questions and lots of scales. I’ll share that on sleep coach tomorrow morning. And it’ll that sleep coach comes out when the sleep has come up Fridays. Yeah. So you’ll see the sleep coach on Friday of this coming week and that’ll have a lot to do with the whole, uh, sleep apnea thing. So what did you learn?

Speaker 5: (50:46)
I learned something very unfortunate, but maybe fortunate, which is you can go from having like the perfect bed. We’ve talked about this in previous conversations with me and my bed, um, to where I’m sleeping on a cloud. And I love my bed to not being able to sleep at night at all for like multiple nights in a row and starting to think of, okay, so what is happening is I have, I went, I started waking up in the middle of the night, right? Thinking that maybe it was the like change between REM and different sleep cycles. You know, a lot of us do wake up at three o’clock in the morning or one o’clock in the morning. Right. So we get an interruption, um, at night time. And so I thought, well, maybe this is just my time to be awake, embrace it. And then go back to bed.

Speaker 5: (51:38)
Well, I was being rudely awakened. I started the, the, the awakening started being a little bit more like not so good. And then it’s progressed over several months, um, to where then I started just my back is hurting. My shoulders are hurting. Um, can’t get comfortable anywhere, no matter how I sleep. And I literally, the last couple of nights went in and started sleeping in my recliner because I needed to sleep up. And, uh, I’ve discovered that my gallbladder and my liver are not very happy. So that’s kind of something that’s been going on. And where I was when Snoop was, was filling in for me was I just was not feeling as sparkly and my normal self. And my unicorn horn was like, wilted was wilting. My sparkles were gone and I was wearing a lot of gray because I’m just,

Speaker 3: (52:34)
I actually thought she looked good in gray, but she’s like, but I’m not sparkly. I’m just supposed to wear gray.

Speaker 5: (52:40)
Um, so yeah, like my sleep cycles were getting interrupted. And so I started doing a little bit more reading and then as I’ve been going to regular doctor visits and they’ve been, you know, going through a lot of different tests and trying to figure stuff out and pinpoint stuff, um, some of that has come back and like how an unhappy gallbladder and liver can affect your sleep cycles and wake you up at night and when it’s active afterwards. Cause if you think we’re like, we’re eating all kinds of stuff during the day time. And then when we go to lay down is when our body is going to read those toxins and process things. And then during our, um, um, circadian cycles and our sleep cycles, we have a lot of hormonal reset releases and there’s a lot of processes that happen during those sleep hours. And even if you were to kind of transverse from Western medicine into Chinese medicine, you know, they put a lot of emphasis on the liver and the gallbladder as a region and a certain

Speaker 3: (53:39)
Dish washing your day away.

Speaker 5: (53:40)
Right? Yeah. And so like the hours, you know, that I was awake or I can’t fall asleep, I’m having like trouble falling asleep. And then when I finally do fall asleep, I wake up and yeah. So all of that is connected. And what I really want to emphasize to you is that, um, you may have an awesome bed. You may purchase that bed. And then six months from now, you may be in so much pain, but take a holistic approach about that. Is it the bed? Is it a warranty issue or has your body changed over that six months? And maybe before thinking about changing your bed, you know, if you’ve invested a lot of money into it, go see your doctor and start mentioning some of these smaller things and have some tests done. I know that we’ve all been staying at home. We’ve all been putting off a lot of these doctor visits. You know, the doctors don’t want you to do that. They want you to come in because this, these are really important things that can affect your daily routine, your nightly routine.

Speaker 3: (54:41)
So we we’ve scolded. We’ve scolded, Mel, because she has put this software

Speaker 5: (54:45)
I have, but we praised her too because she’s getting

Speaker 3: (54:49)
Yeah. To figure it all out. Yeah. She she’s going, she’s going all in. She went from, she went from a why I don’t have a problem to, Oh my gosh. Yeah. So she’s crying, she’s doing the right thing. And, and we, we, we love her to death and we don’t want her to be hurting anymore. So yeah. That’s why she was missing last Friday. And um, now she’s back. She’s not a totally rainbow unicorn yet, but she’s getting there.

Speaker 5: (55:15)
I’m getting my unicorn NES back. Cause I’m getting some answers. Good. Yup. Good. And I don’t have to get rid of my bed. No, yeah, no. I like my bed and my pillow. I love my pillow Nazi carbon. Cool.

Speaker 3: (55:31)
Yes, anyways, but that’s what we learned this week. So, um, we leave you now, uh, with our weekly bloopers. There’s two of them and we appreciate you guys watching this video. Please share and comment. We would appreciate any comments, any questions? We always get questions. We always love questions. So yeah, you guys have a wonderful week.

Speaker 5: (55:52)
Definitely like us share content. Subscribe, go to our website. Www live well furnishings with an s.com

Speaker 3: (56:01)
Right until next week. Have a wonderful week. Bye.

Speaker 5: (56:04)
Yeah.

Speaker 3: (56:10)
Rest means that the head rest itself comes to meet your head when you’re reclining right now, I have it all the way up, but let me show you the difference between this and not having a power head rest. I’m going to bring it down. So now my head’s coming back and

Speaker 6: (56:24)
I’m no longer looking at the TB. Now I can look at the TV, watch this. [inaudible] I’m looking at the TV. Is that not

Speaker 7: (57:07)
Okay? It’s gonna to leave that there. Okay. Well there’s your blooper for this week. Okay.