After my outburst at the fair food panel and then our supermarket snubbing of last week, I’m feeling pretty good about standing strong for what I believe in. Not that there aren’t a few wary onlookers saying things like:
Careful not to get too ‘out there’ Ange.
Maybe you should write about something more positive this week?
Are you sure you want to get Coles & Woolies off side? Maybe don’t mention them by name.
All concerns from loved ones and friends- people who’s opinions I greatly respect. Then there are the comments from strangers:
You have chosen your path in life so don’t blame the supermarkets if your business model is not successful.
How dare you make me feel guilty for shopping at a supermarket!
Plus all the people not saying anything to me directly (I’m sure there’s plenty of them).
But the decision to organise customers to snub the supermarkets feels so incredibly right, I really don’t mind that it concerns (even angers) others. It feels right to me and right to the 400+ people already interested in our first event planned for the Snubbers on the 6th December.
So the leap feels worth it now. post leap. People may be shaking their heads with concern for my knees, but I stuck the landing. As Brett from Megabake experienced, it’s easy to place too much credence in the naysayers and forget the other 95% who are actually applauding.
Looking back at it, this leap was possible because I’d been planning on it internally, wanting it, regretting not having made it, for a very long time. And heck,in the end my emotions made the decision for me so it was too late not to leap.
But what about when you’re premeditating a leap into ‘hardcore’? You haven’t realised your idea yet and you don’t feel like an expert and everyone else does or is in their own ways? They seem to know what they’re talking about and have been there and they’re successful and they’re looking at you with their supportive face saying…
…are you sure you wanna do that?
How do you decide whether to be the black sheep, risk ridicule, and fracturing your knee caps, to do something potentially crazy hardcore and untested?
In my world, right now, I’ve got another leap brewing. Our new coffee venture (finally). Incredible specialty coffee from Sundays Coffee happening from our garden car park corner from this weekend. The hardcore bit: I really really really want to start off on the right foot and one thing I’ve been saying to myself and others from the very beginning has been- no disposable takeaway coffee cups at all! Just don’t offer them as an option! Have keep cups, have a mug exchange, have beautiful handmade local ceramic cups that encourage people to sit in but don’t do disposables! And now I’m feeling nervous.
Am I shooting my new business in the foot before it even begins?
You will completely lose the early construction trade.
It’s brave, it’s great, but I wouldn’t want to be the barista having to tell people we don’t have takeaway cups.
Well done. We couldn’t do it, but you might be able to.
If you start with a hardcore leap, can you ever walk it back? Is it better to just start and then have to disappoint customers who have grown to expect certain things than to start with customers who are fewer in number but also have a hardcore heart?
I don’t know. It just reminds me that business is full of really difficult questions that have no straightforward answers. I want someone to see into my future and tell me I won’t regret the leap. And no one ever can.
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