Event Anxiety

Well, that time of the year has arrived- event anxiety is here. We are only 5 weeks away from the date auction. It may seem like a lot of time, but it really isn't. I know that I don't need to freak out- things are moving along fine, but I keep getting panicked thoughts of 'what if no one shows up!'. We are doing all of the same event marketing that we have done in the past which is important. Word of mouth marketing is one of the best ways to get people to attend, so I really need the bachelors/ettes that are participating to help spread the word and get their friends to attend. I emailed everyone who signed up today and asked them to start spreading the word. We have almost all the guys signed up that we need to, although I am still waiting on some of them to send in their info. We still have a few more spots open for ladies to participate. This is a reversal of what usually happens. We still need gift certificates for the couples to use on their dates and I'm still looking for more event sponsors. I think I need to expand the number of volunteers that we need, since we are going to have our own food at the event- so that will mean more volunteers to help with that.

There is so much pressure associated with this event, it is hard not to get really anxious about it. The most important thing is that I keep working on all the details that need to be handled, get all the marketing lined up, keep getting the word out there- take all the steps that I can to make it a success and hopefully, the rest will fall into place. We have had 4 years of successful events, so there is no reason to think this one will be any different. In my own perfect world- we would already have 100 tickets sold! I know that isn't reality though, people are generally rather last minute when it comes to buying tickets for events and it is still only early August- mid-September seems very far away to most people (particularly those who don't plan events!).

It feels good to vent about my anxiety. I know I should be calm since things are moving along in the right direction, I need to keep reminding myself of that. Well, that's the latest for tonight. I'm off to read some more of the book that my sister gave me, write my list and then head to bed. I've already done my cherries, watermelon & pineapple cottage cheese and blueberry muffin snacking for tonight! Until tomorrow friends...

Tidying Up

Well, this is going to be a quick post since it is already after 1am! I don't have anything incredibly exciting to share, but I didn't want to go another night without blogging. Things are moving along on the date auction front, even though I get moments of panic when I think that no one will ever come to the event- it will just be me and 40 bachelor/ettes that I will be forced to bid on! Of course, that won't happen, but there is always the fear of having a disaster on your hands. In order to prevent such a disaster from ever happening, I've been working on lining up the marketing for the event. I'm copying pretty much everything that I did last year for marketing and I'm trying to expand. The good news is that through a sponsorship trade, I got a much better deal on a magazine ad that we are doing (we did the same ad last year). I'm still short of our sponsorship goal, but the good news is that I've been able to make some significant cost savings which helps a lot.

It is rather amazing how the date auction ever comes together. There are so many pieces that have to fit together in order to have a successful event- sponsors, marketing, vendors, hosts, venue, gift certificate donations, auction items, bachelors/ettes, volunteers. Speaking of volunteers, I need to get a volunteer coordinator who can come with me earlier in the day to help set up and then manage the volunteers as they come in. That is such an important job and I need someone to do it because I get bogged down with all the other things that are happening at the event. I do a volunteer responsibilities list that I print out for the volunteers, but I still need a person to make sure everything runs smoothly. There is one person that I have in mind who might be interested. The difficult part is that it is during the work day for most people.

Today, I did calendar photos at Worcester PD and I also made another donation of stuffed animals, coloring books/crayons and reading books. The photos came out well. Then I headed up to Westminster to pick up an auction item donation at Wachusett Brewery and stopped at the Olive Garden in Marlborough to pick up a $50 gift card donation. That was the most they have ever donated, so that was a nice surprise. There is a restaurant that has donated a gift certificate for the past few years for our event- every year the donation gets smaller. It used to be a $75 gift certificate, then it went to a $50 one last year and now it is a $40 one. I don't know if maybe business hasn't been as good for them and that's why they are cutting back. It is a popular place though. Every donation is appreciated, but I naturally wish they could match what they used to do!

Tomorrow, I'm taking a half a vacation day. I have some emails to send in the morning, then I am heading out. I have a fancy event to attend tomorrow night which I am really looking forward to. I spent this evening tidying up- I was cleaning my office, but it still needs more work. I was also tidying up some loose ends that needed to get taken care of- paying bills, organizing some documents, writing thank you letters, updating the new Smiling Stiletto website- that type of thing. There is a lot more that I need to do, but I'm getting tired now and my eyes are starting to hurt.

It is almost 1:30, so I am off to bed. No list writing tonight! Until next time friends..

Persistence

One of the keys to running a successful business that I think isn't discussed enough is persistence. Yes, you do hear that it is important, but it can't be said enough how crucial it is for success. It is even more important than brains, connections, a good product/service- none of that means much without the persistence and drive to keep going, particularly when things are difficult. I can't tell you how many times I need to follow up with people to get things done on a daily basis. There are frequent times when I think about giving up on a person, but decide to make one more follow up call and that is the one that leads to success. When I get a rejection letter from a grant, my first response (after the first couple of minutes of disappointment during the short drive back from the post office) is to get back on the computer and start searching for the next grant that we can apply for. It is that drive to keep going in the face of rejection that is so important.

I was particularly thinking about how important it is to be persistent today- I was doing a lot of follow up with our calendar, date auction and anniversary event. We have a lot of auction items that have been promised, but now I need to focus on getting them in hand. It can take a lot of phone calls/emails just to get the items that people already promised months ago. There is one auction item that I will be picking up this week which took 4 messages and 3 emails since March in order to get. It isn't a particularly big auction item either. I know that people are busy, but sometimes it does get frustrating the amount of time that I have to spend following up with people.

On that note friends, I am off to bed. It is barely midnite, but I'm rather tired. It was another late night last night- almost 2am- and I was definitely feeling it this morning. I really feel a lot more awake when I get to bed earlier. So I am going to eat a few more cherries, write my list and sleep. Until tomorrow friends...

Good News

Good news on the grant front friends! On Friday, we received a $3,000 grant from the DCU Foundation! That was a great way to wrap up the month. I was really getting worried with the grants, so it is really good to have some good news. The funny thing is that when I felt the envelope, I was convinced it was too thin to have a check in it. While I was opening it in the post office, I kept psyching myself up that it was OK if it was a rejection- there are lots of other grants to apply for and we're still waiting on news from other grants. I definitely thought it was going to be bad news, especially since they seemed to respond rather quickly to our application. Imagine my happiness when I opened the letter and saw the corner of the check, then read the amount- what a relief! Obviously, this helps financially and it is also encouraging for other grants. Foundations and other organizations are still giving money and we can still get sizable support. I don't mean to sound like I didn't appreciate the $500 grants that we received recently, but the reality is that $500 grants don't go very far. Every donation is important, no matter what size, but we definitely need the bigger amounts to come in steadily. That is the only way we can maintain what we are doing and grow- the real goal is growing, not just maintaining what we have.

Well, there is a lot more to write about but it is already 12:45 and I need to at least seriously attempt to get to my 1am bedtime. I was working on the email blast for our Smiling Stiletto August event and it took longer than expected. I even managed to add the event link to our new website all by myself- I am rather proud of my techie ability! Smiling Stiletto is the new name for the Hello Stiletto Shoe Club which I recently took over. It is a social organization for shoe lovers. We get together regularly for parties and other fun events- some of those events benefit Project Smile! Feel free to check out our new website at www.smilingstiletto.com

I'm off to write my list and dash to bed. Until tomorrow friends..

The Unexpected

I know this has nothing to do with work, but I wanted to share. I went to Horseneck Beach on Saturday with a girl friend. We were hanging out in the water, very close to shore. I saw a life guard jump down from his post, but I didn't pay much attention. A few minutes later, I noticed a small group of beach goers gathered around a man lying on the sand with life guards kneeling in the sand next to him. They were only about 30 feet away. The life guard started doing CPR on the man, police arrived and more life guards and the crowd grew bigger. After what seemed like a long while, even though it probably wasn't, the ambulance arrived. The man was lifted into the dune buggy, the life guard still doing CPR on him. I had never seen anyone do CPR for real in person. It turns out the man drowned. He was 61 years old, from San Francisco. It said the State Police had to work to identify him, so it sounds like he had been at the beach by himself. It was so incredibly sad and shocking to see the lifeguards working on him and then to find out that he died. I was hoping they were able to bring him back. It is such a reminder about how short life can be. Things can just end in an instant. I'm sure that man had no idea that he was going to die when he went to the beach. It's so easy to get caught up with all the stress of work or personal matters or get bogged down with things that one forgets to enjoy all the little moments and to make the most of each day- because you just never know when it is all over. I don't mean to sound preachy, it was just so shocking to see and I feel so sorry for the poor man who died by himself in such a sad way.

Well, moving on to more cheerful things. Today was not the most productive day. I woke up this morning feeling like I had a stomach bug- so bad that I couldn't even work. I decided to go back to bed, I slept for a while and woke up feeling much better. I was able to get some work done, not nearly as much as I intended, but at least I got some things done. I don't know what caused me to feel so sick, I'm glad it didn't last. We're doing well with recruiting bachelors for the date auction which is great. A friend of mine just recruited 5 more people over the weekend. We're at the half-way point for ladies who have signed up. It usually is the other way around- we always fill the ladies spots before the guys.

There is more to write about, but I'm getting tired. It isn't even midnight yet, but I think I will get an early night. I'm doing photos in Burlington tomorrow and have about a million things to work on as well- including grants. I'm getting far behind on grant work again which isn't good. On that note, I'm off to write my list. Until tomorrow...

Much to Do

Yes, it is the constant refrain- I have so much to do! I've been working on emails and other things related to Project Smile for the past 3 hours and I'm not sure how much I actually got accomplished- I did get stuff done, but it feels like I should have done a lot more. I wasn't even intending to keep working tonight, but I've been running around a lot lately doing photos and other things, so I need more time sitting at my desk and working. I did a donation of stuffed animals, books and coloring books/crayons to Sommerville PD today. It has been almost a year since our last donation there. Then later I did calendar photos at Upton PD. It is so funny to see how big the kids are getting who have been in our calendar for a few years now. They have are a very supportive department. Tomorrow, I'm probably doing photos at Worcester PD.

Yesterday, I did photos with a Franklin family- two girls about 10 and 15 years old with their little dog. The photos came out great. The little dog was hilarious. When the mom said certain words to him, the dog would immediately look up, turn his head to the side and his ears would perk up- he looked like he was ready to have an actual conversation. I've been doing a lot of photos with babies lately, so it has been nice these past couple of days to do photos with older kids- they can sit still and smile on command! I need to keep following up to schedule the remaining photo shoots. We still have plenty of time to get the calendar done, but I like to get it finished as early as possible so I can focus on other things.

Well, I'm getting rather tired- I went to bed incredibly late last night. I need to write my list and I think I'm going to have some cheese and crackers. I already had some watermelon. For a while, I was trying not to eat anything that wasn't fruit late at night- but I'm craving goat cheese and Pretzel Crisps. I need to get to bed at a decent hour so I can be super productive tomorrow. Until next time friends..

400th Blog Posting!

Well, this is a milestone- my 400th blog posting! I wish I had something epic to share to mark the moment- perhaps a million dollar donation? We did receive a $500 from a local bank today. We had asked for $3,000. This is the first time I approached this bank, so I'm glad that they donated something- every donation helps. It was disappointing that they weren't able to do a larger donation, but at least they were able to contribute. This seems to be a bit of a pattern- ask for $3,000 and receive $500. Perhaps I should ask for $10,000 so we can get $2,500. I haven't done any grant writing this week, so I need to get working on that tomorrow.

What else is going on? I was at the police academy recruiting bachelors for our date auction- always a tough job, but someone has to do it! Just kidding of course, it is a great time to go up there and recruit. I signed up four bachelors which was good. Tomorrow, I need to follow up with more of the people that have signed up, but still haven't sent in their info yet for the program and our website. I also need to work on getting more gift certificates donated for the couples to use on their date.

Calendar photos are coming out great. It is always fun doing the photos. We are at about the half way point right now. We have some new families in it as well which is really good. I still have some more calendar ads to take care of- that is going on tomorrow's list too.

Well, I think that's it for tonight. I know this was not exactly the most exciting blog post, especially not for a 400th blog post! I'm off to eat some cherries and maybe watermelon too. Summer fruit is the best. Until tomorrow friends...