Has your business evolved or changed from its original intention?

[VanKalkerFarms]

How has the trajectory of your business evolved since its inception? Have you witnessed a diversification of offerings, a departure from the initial business model, or a significant shift in its fundamental nature?

[TCSlaguna]

We have diversified our product offerings a lot more than when we started, and lean in heavy on jewelry now. 

We offer a lot more services than we used to. A lot of this possible thanks to Square Appointments and Square Online, which makes it easy for clients to read about the services and book on our website. 

I think what's equally important is that the data Square provides has allowed us to determine to no longer carry some items or categories of products and focus on items with high turnover. 

[DinaLRosenberg]

Great question!

we monitor our stock offerings in real time- trying to make sure that we are stocking what is selling. In the past 5 1/2 years we've definitely cycled through tons of "hot" products. The trick is using Square reports to monitor stock and sales real time so you aren't stuck holding inventory.

[Lovewell]

@VanKalkerFarms For us we make sure we are sticking true to our mission statement and the foundation of what we wanted our shop to look like. Sure we have merchandise that changes up, and we offer seasonal drinks, but our core menu has stayed the same and we strive to see how we can do the staple things better and serve better.

[JUYBoutique20]

We've definitely added different products than what we started with.  We've actually been able to market that line as a separate store.  

[MudFire_Dex]

Great question @VanKalkerFarms - we have - we used to offer long-format - weekend workshops with 'famous' artists that could only have 12 or so participants due to space in the classroom. Classes were expensive and required a lot of labor outside of the class as well as prepping meals and snacks. We decided to pivot to beginners classes that don't require that amount of prep and costs - are much less expensive but increased 'class' profit as a segment of business over the past 8 years by 30x what it was in the long-format workshop model that we inherited with the business purchase.

[sugarlab]

Ohh this is a great question! I feel like I have been the queen of the pivot! We started as made to order, just my mom and myself. Slowly grew and opened a small retail shop. Then moved after 3 years. Much more typical retail spot, open 5 days a week. Then after 5 years there we moved to a more tourist spot, open 7 days a week. After 3 years there, we moved yet again and went back to our roots as made to order. We've slowed down our business, cut our employees in half, and stuck with what we love: weddings and events. I honestly don't think I've felt this content with my life. 

[CareyJo]

When we opened in 2017, we were coming from several years of being back in the field working for someone else after having owned our first HVAC business and other businesses.  We decided that we were going to do this one different and focus on homeowners rather than mobile homeowners as we did before.  We quickly learned that although there is a real need for that work because so few people know how to do it, those homeowners don't have money and can't pay their bills.  Not trying to stereotype, it's just a fact.  We cannot afford to live off of people who don't pay their bills.  Focusing on stick built, people with higher incomes and who maintain their properties, was a huge win.  We began to take on and seek out more commercial clients and that brings in higher revenue, so we continued to grow that area.  We have again shifted and are now seeing nearly 90% of our workload be commercial.  We're going to continue in that direction while not pushing any residential clients away and seek additional commercial contracts.  We're nearing retirement and eventually will cut the residential down to less than 5% and will have almost 90% in just contracts, making the workload very easy to maintain after 'retirement' to keep the business open until we replace the income with something else.