A Winning Formula For Success - Clarity, Focus and Goals

Running your business without having a clear vision or an end goal in mind  is like sailing a ship without a destination.  In order to create a successful business you must know where you are going , create an action plan and strategy , create clear and precise goals and take daily action steps that consistently move you toward your end goal.

While nothing in life is absolutely guaranteed, success is a formula and if you follow certain steps (You may have to tweak some here and there along the way)  you are sure to get it right eventually, so here are three common sense tips that are sure to stack the odds in your favor.

Tip #1 - Create a Clear Big Picture With an End Result in Mind.    

Create a crystal clear  mental picture of where you want to take your business and why. What is your Vision? Where do you plan to take this business? Write it down.

Are you looking to bake out of your home as a simple Cottage Food Operation, Licensed Home Bakery, Storefront or are you looking to be the Sylvia Weinstock of  Cookies?  Start with the big picture in mind. Don’t worry if what you truly want in your heart seems impossible at the moment.

Write it down, put it on paper and give yourself a time line. Don’t worry about whether or not you will be able to achieve it in that time frame or not, just get going.  Do not allow the Nazi in your head to stop you, so this is what I want you to do.

Take a piece of paper , preferably a notebook where you keep all your ideas and plans for your business and write this out.

Example:
My vision : To build a cookie EMPIRE that spans the entire east coast of the United States and 20+ franchises in Europe by December 2023.

Why do you want the big goal?  What is it that drives you? Why do you want this success?

It’s very important that you be just as clear about why you want your goal. What compels you to want this ?

Example:
Why: Because I LOVE baking and decorating cookies. That is my gift and and through my gift , I will build my cookie empire which will  provide a secure future for my family, a college education for my son, I will employ talented people and help them to reach their goals and help their families succeed. Through my success as an entrepreneur I will be able to contribute financially to those causes that are close to my heart and I will be able to assist others, hence leaving the earth, having done my part to fulfill my highest potential, which is to contribute to mankind in a positive way.

Note: Make sure your reason, is not just about you.  Make sure you reach out beyond yourself and  include those things that are important to you such as your family, causes you may support . This should be aligned with your life's purpose.  Financial success, without contribution or anyone to share it with is the ultimate failure. The only way to truly feel fulfilled in life is to give back , during and after you have achieved success for yourself.

TIP # 2 - If You Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail.

Merely wanting something is not enough, you must first map out your goals and then put plans and a strategy in place to attain them. Set up your goals and add intended dates for achievement.   I don’t like to use the word deadline. I am a strong believer in the power of words and I don’t like using anything having to do with dead in my business .

Example:

• ( 10 years out) Long term goal: By 2023 my goal is to have 30 Wacky Cookie Store locations, all over the East coast of the United States, and 20 + franchises all over The European Union.          
• (5 years out) By 2018 my goal is to have 10+ Wacky Cookies Store locations to have a storefront operation each with three part time employees, a full time baking assistant and a full time decorating assistant.  
• (3 years out) List goals here
• (1 year out) List goals here

You get the idea, right?  Always work back from the bigger picture. Use the backwards planning technique.

Click Here for a good article on Backwards Planning 

TIP # 3-  Set Clear Goals for Consistent Improvement. 

Regularly check to make sure those goals are in direct alignment with your big picture.  

Utilize the Cookiepreneur formula for success M^2-  Mechanics x Mindset ( Creates the synergy for success)

Mechanics

Set up a practical step by step plan, take daily action toward your big goal by breaking it down into smaller daily goals. This can be as small as a single phone call per day, but the key is to do something, each and every day that will move you closer to your goal.

Mindset

If you ever want to achieve success you must  utilize positive thinking and visualization techniques and exercises to see your outcome (If you can see it you can be it! It’s not just a saying, it’s true) The world's most successful entrepreneurs, CEO's, athletes and performers use visualization techniques often to achieve their goals, and as Cookiepreneurs we are no different in our ambition to manifest a desired result for ourselves.

You must have the psychological element in place in order to reach your goals, I cannot emphasize that strongly enough.

A great book to help you with visualization exercises and to cultivate a Wealth Mindset in general with practical exercises is The Wealth Diet by Kathy Zant . 

The Wealth Diet

I love this book , because it is written from the heart by a real person.  I know Kathy, I am proud to call her my friend and she is an amazing entrepreneur, mother and someone just like you and me and is genuine in her message to help others succeed in life.

You may see yourself in this book, as I did.  Remember that I told you , when we first started this journey that I am a very strong believer in the inner game to success.  I believe that your outer world is merely a reflection of your inner landscape, so for many of you what that means is that you need to start working on success from the inside out.

Before you become a successful Cookiepreneur, first you must see yourself in that role. 

You must see yourself at the finish line before you get there and this book is a wonderful and indispensable tool, full of nuggets of wisdom and a-ha moment provoking passages that will help get you there.

I promised you that we would have lots of goodies and freebies here so make sure you click on the book below in order to secure your  your chance to win an autographed copy of The Wealth Diet.

Click HERE for your chance to win an autographed copy of The Wealth Diet,  The Proven, 4-Week Program that Realigns Your Mindset to Greater Wealth, Abundance and Happiness Giveaway  

I told  Kathy about this project and my journey to help you uncover and cultivate those wonderful gifts you have and she generously offered a copy of her book to one lucky winner, that could be you!

We will also touch on these subjects during our free teleconferences.  Sign up here  if you have not already and we will be sure to let you know as soon as we start offering these in July.

If you want to take it a step further, and are really serious about getting this down to a science , I will be offering  this as part of the curriculum in our  M² Elite Series Webinars starting in late summer / early fall . We are going to open pre-registration in a few weeks. These will be small group online classes I will teach you the step by step fool proof way to Create a compelling vision for your business based upon your life's purpose and how  to construct a comprehensive plan to get there.

For those of you who really wish to Go big or go home as I often do,  I have also decided to open up a few spaces for one on one Personal Business Coaching. This is the ultimate coaching program.  This is a series of  meetings ( Online  if you are in another state) where  you and me will work together directly in order to help you reach all of your business goals.  I bring every bit of knowledge, experience and resources that I have to the table in order to assist you in setting  up your vision , breaking it down  into manageable bite sized chunks, and helping you see it come into fruition..

I am so excited  to offer this to only a select number of people who are really serious about this process. Due to the number of requests this will be an invitation only type program and we will begin taking applications for this program the first week of August.

So in summing up this week, you already know that in order to create a successful business you need to have  

• Absolute clarity about what you want, and know why.
• Create a plan to get there.
• Set clear goals that are aligned with your big picture. 
• Take daily steps toward your goal, it doesn't matter how small, the key is consistency!

As always, I leave you with what I believe to be the absolute truth

Persistence is the key to success, never give up, Never!

Wishing you a wonderful and prosperous week.

Aymee 

Cookiepreneur Mindset 101- Overcoming The "F" Word

 I have to warn you that this week’s post may be a bit difficult for you to read, particularly if you are the kind of person who gives up after the first blow or thinks that just because you made a big  mistake you should give up.

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Fact, life is NOT fair more often than not and when you decide that you are going to go for it and open a business, you do it with the best of intentions,  Your hope is that everything will go smoothly. I am here to tell you that more often than not , things will not go totally smoothly, sometimes something may happen that may put the very survival of your business in jeopardy . 

 I am telling you right here and now that  if you ever want to achieve BIG success first you need to make friends with the one thing keeps grown men from sleeping at night. That horrible F thing that puts most people out of business permanently when they experience it for the very first time. The horrendous, ugly and unthinkable word that no one wants to talk about because we all want people to think we are perfect. The dreaded F thing that you will experience many times in your career as an Entrepreneur and must learn to embrace.

The “F” word I am talking about is FAILURE!

Cookie Business Guru or Human?

A close friend suggested I not write this post.  How will this make you look to the other ladies? Talking about your failures ? They will discuss you for weeks behind your back!  Good I said, if this teaches them something.

Fact is, this blog is not about constructing a flawless public image of myself  a Cookie Business Guru that has never failed at anything. The fact is if you ever find one of those, run in the opposite direction because they have nothing to offer you except a carefully crafted  image of perfection that you will never achieve. Not because you are not a fabulous businesswoman, because perfection does not exist. Gurus do not exist! They just want you to think they do, but I have earned my experience through trial and error, just like you will.  I just happen to be here now, because I have gone through it and if I can help you avoid the same you bet I am going to try.

    

So Yes, I am going there. The cold hard truth is if, if you do not develop sound psychological resiliency and a strong mindset as to how to deal with and embrace failure then a business of your own may not be the best option.

So at this point you are probably thinking , wow Aymee,, what an abrasive delivery.  You bet your cookies it is and I want to drive my point home , so pull up a chair, grab your coffee and listen up because this is going to be one of the most important lessons you will ever learn as a Cookierepreneur.

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The Cookie Business, or any other business is NOT for the fainthearted!

As a Cookiepreneur you are going to make mistakes.  Sometimes it will be something that you thought was the right thing to do, and will turn out to be a complete disaster.  Sometimes, it will be a dumber mistake, like the one I made and that I will tell you about later on in this post.  These mistakes may lead to failure but when they do…. Always remember this.

 The ONLY thing that separates a “winner” from a “loser” is their ability to turn failure into success.

 Let me repeat that in a different way. The ONLY difference between a person who is successful and a person who is not, is the meaning they give to their failure and what they they do about it.

Please do not think that I am calling anyone a loser.  I simply use these two broad terms to draw contrast and to help you understand that there truly is no such thing as failing in life until you decide to give up.  

Let me share a personal story with you.  Not one of my early “failures”  I can tell you a million of those , rather one that recently happened to me, and when I say recent I mean about two months ago that threatened to wipe me off the map as a cookie business.

Had I not put a strategy in place to deal with this, I would have most certainly gone under right away, I would not be writing this right now, and I you would never be able benefit from this information.

My Most Recent Epic Fail

As you know, my main cookie business is  The Wacky Cookie Company.  About  two years ago, I discovered a wonderful website called Etsy, that many of you may be familiar with.

For the benefit of those of you who are not, Etsy is a huge global online marketplace for handcrafted goods, and it is the ideal place for Artisans who create everything from jewelry to handmade cards, quilts, baked goods and art to come together and sell their products.

Etsy is a  Billion dollar  industry and if you have a quality product, with a smidgen of marketing acumen,  and good photography skills, with the help of Etsy you can start making very good money with your business in a relatively short period of time. Millions of people, that are interested in the “handmade” product niche visit daily.  

Needless to say, I started building a good presence on Etsy at first with  Wacky Cookies , and decided to branch out and open up a Gourmet hand poured candy shop, The Candied Flower, as well as another shop called Rainbow Sweets that was dedicated exclusively to the marketing of my rainbow colored cookies, and finally I opened my latest shop earlier this year called CookieBurger, which featured my latest brand of Gourmet Crème Filled Cookie Sandwiches .       

About a year ago, I had my first little run in with ETSY due to  some cookies that I created for a client’s baby shower. The theme was Burberry Love, and as you can see from the pictures below, the cookies were to follow the Burberry theme  which I am a huge fan of.

I listed these cookies for sale on ETSY , under a listing name that did not mention Burberry at all, but one of the tags were Burberry inspired.  My client who had ordered these is a stylist and she had submitted the table she put together to be featured as a guest submission on the Amy Atlas website, and was selected which drew massive attention to my shop.

About two weeks after these were featured via the Amy Atlas blog, I received an email from the ETSY Legal department which included a notice of copyright infringement from The Burberry Legal  Department asking that I please remove my cookies because they resembled Burberry’s trademarked Nova Check pattern.

The listing was deactivated and  that was the last I heard of them.

Fast forward a year and I receive yet another notice from the ETSY Legal Department letting me know that The Wacky Cookies has been shut down along with my three other shops for repeated instances of copyright infringement.

This  time it was two other listings in question that had triggered the notice.  This time there was no cease and desist notice from a huge corporation owning the rights to the likeness of my cookies.  My shop had been “reported” by a fellow Etsy  shop owner or someone who is a member of the Etsy community . Etsy did not disclose who reported my shop. 

The culprits pictured above 1. Aloha Kitty  2. Block Heads 

Their claim was that Hello Kitty is a registered trademark of  Sanrio and the Lego Heads are a registered trademark of Lego and that due to my “repeated” instances of copyright infringement, my privileges as an Etsy seller have now been revoked, forever more leaving me no recourse whatsoever.

Now, keep in mind. I had NEVER committed any kind of copyright infringement in any of my other shops,  they contained 100% original material designed by yours truly but they were shut down as well, all in one fell swoop, therefore rendering most of my channels of income DEAD in an instant.

My first offense was innocent enough, as I did not use the Burberry name and quite frankly did not think that it would be a big deal. The last two , were one of the dumbest mistakes I could have EVER made as a Cookiepreneur.

So what happened? Why and how could I have made such a stupid mistake? The fact is I am human! I got careless and complacent, I did not listen to my inner voice about slowing down when I should have, and I was just so tired from working all the time that I made reviewing my listings and making sure that everything  was okay a second priority .

I have been well aware that Etsy has a very erratic way of doing away with shops that contain any designs that are licensed. I figured that I would be okay if I did not actually write “Hello Kitty”  and even though it was her face, it was my outfit design , Stupid mistake!  .

The fact is there are tons of cookie shops on Etsy who do this. Yours may be one of them and it’s all too tempting to list cookies that your clients ask you for over and over again that are in fact trademarked designs by a huge Corp. Don’t do it!

I got tired of people sending me private messages asking me , Do you make Hello Kitty cookies? I don’t see any listed in your shop?

I am telling you this story for several reasons 1. As a cautionary tale  2. Because I want you to know that you will make dumb mistakes now and again , that may cost you everything unless you are prepared 3. If these mistakes bring you to a point of failure, you will know how to deal with the failure and turn it around  on a dime.

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The Turnaround

So, here I am, every single one of my Etsy shops has been shut down and my stream of income, paralyzed.  Sure, I had a good 50 orders in my pipeline to fill, but now I would have to scramble to try and set up my shops once again to bring in new traffic, even so , how would I get that amount of traffic without Etsy power? I thought about all of that but did not dwell, I sprang into action..

I shared my ordeal with a group of my closest cookie colleagues as a vent and I thought nothing more of it and went into full swing without even flinching. I worked 72 hours straight with the help of one of my best friends and my PA from time to time, and we were able to get a new shop up.

I already had my own Wacky Cookies website, for the past few years, even before Etsy , but I felt the design had become outdated and it would not appeal to people wishing to just purchase a listing of cookies, rather than going through an entire process of having to contact me via email or telephone to inquire about cookies, how much they cost, etc.

The first 72 hours after the incident, my adrenaline was pumping hard and I scrambled around to save my business from doom when all of a sudden, the fourth day, after this happened  I checked back into my Etsy shop , viewed my stats and  that is when the reality of what had happened to me hit me in the face, like a wet dirty mop.

I collapsed on my sofa and started crying.  My heart was broken and I thought MY GOD what will I do now?  I have worked so hard to build this business for the past few years, and thanks to ETSY it exploded into this enormous success.  Where will I get all of my traffic from now? What will I do? The saddest part being that I had so stupidly left a huge chink in my armor, that threatened to bring me down unless I moved rapidly.

I strongly believe in that saying “What we resist, persists” Therefore I decided to not fight the sadness and  give myself the rest of the day off and grieve for what was. How could I have been so stupid? I decided to forgive myself for that too, I am only human, I am not a machine.

I woke up the next day  ready to do battle and , well, what I had not yet mentioned to you is  that in spite of my shop being shut down, I kept receiving emails and requests for my cookies. Several per day, from my loyal client base. Both via my business email and Etsy.

It just so happens that over the past few years I have been working very hard to make sure that I provide my customers with top quality cookies and amazing customer service.

Repeat customers are the ones who truly build your business and  make you money.  

Thanks to that I have built a solid and loyal client base that has kept coming back for their children’s birthday parties, Anniversaries, Weddings, Christenings, Baby Showers and most of their most important occasions that call for cookies. Some of these clients found me through Etsy, some did not, but they are part of my loyal and solid base that I can count on. 

When I started thinking about what happened and how I could correct this so it would not happen again It also occurred to me that I did not listen to my instincts when they were telling me that I should start this Cookipreneur venture sooner , that is allowing me the platform to tell you this story about a year ago.  Yup, this idea has been rolling around in my head for over a year, my inner voice was screaming at me to do it, but I ignored it and continued to take more and more orders.

So, once I had collected myself , the proverbial light bulb in my head went off.  My goodness, I can start my Cookiepreneur blog now. This  is a blessing in disguise. I have been wanting to do this for the past year, but my business keeps getting crazier and crazier leaving me no time.  

So crazy that I am left time to do nothing else, and that is fine , if that is what I truly wanted to do, but for me, you see THIS, what I am doing right now, talking to you, telling you about my challenges and how I have overcome them, this is what I REALLY want to do , so you see, that is the meaning that I have given my “failure” .

WAIT, I cannot, even say that it’s a failure, I honestly don’t see it that way, I see it as a lesson, as a means of being forced to slow down a bit, and re-think what Is my true love in life, which is Personal Development, and giving people the tools of resiliency (Remember my first post? The Journey Begins The decision I made to help others? )Well , here I am.  I am going to get all spiritual on you, but the Universe, God, your higher power,  higher mind, whatever you pray to, always delivers what you ask for, ALWAYS!

Well let me give you an update on my cookie business. The Wacky Cookies is alive and well.  All the hard work, love and dedication I put into my customers the past few years, has paid off.  Things have slowed down a bit, and I do mean just a bit. I am still insanely busy and  I find it hilarious that some of my cookie colleagues actually thought I would close down. because of this.

I have filed for a Trademark on my new brand of Gourmet Creme Filled Cookies named CookieBurger, by The Wacky Cookie Company and have sold more of them than I have been able to produce thus far ( working on it). The orders are pouring in, and I have to say, the R&D that I did on these things for a year, really paid off ( That will be another post) They are delicious, and look how cute they are (Pictured below) I love them.

My point, I am doing awesome , and I am not even two months out from what could have been a major catastrophe and the end of my career as a Cookiepreneur.   I am less stressed, have a little more time to dedicate to what I LOVE to do besides cookies, and have even managed to launch a new brand of cookies.. Now if that is not bouncing back, I don't know what is. 

To sum up, I want you to remember the following things when it comes to dealing with failures in your business.

There is no such thing as failure unless you give up!

A true Cookiepreneur, only faces challenges. There are smaller challenges and greater ones.  True failure is when you decide that the blow is so hard that you just give up and quit.

Don't expect to do it right, all the time.

Fact, you will make mistakes, serious ones like I did. They do NOT have to be the end of you and your business. Learn from your mistakes and build on that. 

Failure can be turned around in an instant depending on the meaning you give it.

If you are one of those people who hit the first snag , and feel that the world is out to get you and that nothing you  do is right, etc etc, then forget it . If you decide that this is just another challenge and you see this as a new beginning, or as a vehicle to figure out how to do things better, congratulations, you are half way home in turning it around.

Always do your best, and it will pay off in the end, even if you make mistakes.

It's clear that I made a serious mistake, but my hard work the past few years paid off and has kept me alive. By taking advantage of  Etsy as a catalyst, I have built a solid client base that has allowed my business not only to survive, but thrive during a challenging period.

I will leave you with one of my favorite quotes by a man that you will probably hear me mention often because of the respect and admiration I have for him. A true winner, not because he is a billionaire, but because he had the guts to endure so many failures that would make a grown man head for the hills with his tail between his legs.

“Not many people are willing to give failure a second opportunity. They fail once and it’s all over. The bitter pill of failure is often more than most people can handle. If your’re willing to accept failure and learn from it, if you’re willing to consider failure as a blessing in  disguise and bounce back, you’ve got the potential of harnessing one of the most powerful success forces”

 - Joseph Sugarman-

A good way to strengthen your mind and spirit against failure is to read great Personal Development books.  You can start with anything by Tony Robbins  or get Entrepreneurial mindset coaching or both!. Invest in yourself, you’re worth it! I have invested thousands of dollars over the years in my Personal Development Education, I would argue that it was an even better investment than college 

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Very soon I will be announcing a series of teleconferences and online webinars, among them the  M2 Elite Series webinars, there will be a series dedicated to the “mindset” part of being an Entrepreneur.

Anyone can teach you the mechanics of how to run a business,  but mindset is by far the most important part.  If you have that in place, you will not only survive any challenge, you will turn it around and make it into one of your greatest successes.

Good luck, I wish you a wonderful and prosperous week and always remember this.

Persistence is the Key to success, never give up, NEVER!

Aymee 

p.s. I would love to hear some of your stories of psychological resiliency and how you overcame a difficult situation in business.   

Cookiepreneurship 101- Time Management and how it Impacts your Small Business

The cold hard fact is ….. How well you manage your time can make or break your small business.

One of the greatest challenges that I faced when I first started The Wacky Cookie Company was having to do everything on my own.  As a Cookiepreneur, with no assistance you are probably juggling all of these tasks almost on a  daily basis.  If you do not manage your time correctly, you will get very little done, no matter how talented or creative you are.  

·         Marketing/ Advertising

·         R&D ( Research and Development) of new Products and recipes

·         Expand  and Learning New techniques

·         Quote Custom orders

·         Baking

·         Decorating

·         Packaging

·         Shipping

·         Customer Service ( Answering Emails/ Telephone calls)

Anyone trying to do all of these things every single day is bound to go nuts or burn out sooner or later, therefore I have a few general tips to help you bring this under immediate control starting with the most important.

Tip #1- TMS Yourself-  Time Management System 

Get a superior time management system. There are tons of them on the market, look around and find something that works for you. Over the years I tried calendars, agendas, notebooks etc until I found Simpelology.

All I can say about it is WOW! Either go get this book (by clicking on it) which I highly recommend , or go to their website and sign up.  If you get the book, it will be much easier to understand how it all works, at least for me it was at first.

An added bonus of Simpel.ology is that it basically is a Business Guru in a box type website. The founder Mark Joyner, is an expert at marketing and this guy knows and has worked with some of the top business people in the world , so hands down this is what I recommend but again, get whatever works for you.

Tip#2- DO NOT make a habit of overbooking yourself.  

We have all done it at some point, You know you are booked to the hilt that week and a good client approaches you, so you take that order ( I will squeeze it in for you, is my favorite thing to say).  Then another, and another until you have so many orders that once you come to realize it you have been working for seventy-two hours with only 4 hours of sleep.

Now, notice I wrote do not make a habit of it, not don’t ever do it.  Once in a while it’s okay to work really hard. As a Cookiepreneur, you will have to be flexible and sometimes you just have to stretch a bit, especially around holidays. Sometimes you may just want or need that extra cash and that is great but let me  give you a few of the most important reasons why you should not make a habit of it.

First, you will burn out. It’s impossible for any human being, no matter how healthy, fit or mentally sound to work at that level for any prolonged period of time without burning out.

Secondly, you will wind up feeling angry and resentful and start making stupid decisions as a result.  You will be cranky, and it will come across in your communication to your clients and you will start burning bridges and making overall bad decisions.

Remember, proper rest is paramount to running a successful business!

Lastly, You want to enjoy what you are doing for a living.  When you are churning out cookies like a machine, you lose perspective of why you are doing this in the first place. It stops being an artistic endeavor and becomes a factory like assembly line of cookies that become one big blur to you. 

In the coming weeks we will talk more about pricing your cookies properly so that you don’t have to work as hard and make a decent living doing this .

Tip #3- Leverage yourself

If you are very busy, hire help.

Let me explain to you why it is to your advantage to hire either someone to help you bake or perhaps hire an assistant or virtual assistant to help you manage emails, computer/technology related tasks like website upkeep etc.

I got to a point in my business where I was shipping out 30-40 orders a week last summer. Clearly, it was impossible for me to physically do all of that so I decided that I was going to hire a baking assistant to help me.

I met a wonderful lady who happened to be working at a local Subway sandwich shop that I frequented and I was so impressed with the way she worked the moment I thought about hiring someone, I thought about her and offered her the job.

I found out how much money she was making at Subway and offered her an extra dollar per hour so that she was making $8.50 per hour working as my part time baking assistant.

I trained her and taught her how to make my cookie dough and my icing. She already knew how to clean and organize things in the kitchen and her work ethic was off the charts. She helped me do everything except for the actual decorating, that is much trickier as you know but it was a match made in heaven.

Simple Math

Now for those of you who are worried about hiring someone because it will cut into your profits, let’s do a bit of simple math here just so I can give you an idea of how much you are leaving on the table by not hiring someone.

I was up to an average of 35 orders per week.  My average order is about $45.00  so that is $1,575.00.

I had my assistant working with me an average of 25 hours per week (About 6 hours per day) at $8.50 per hour which equals about $212.50 .  My gross income is $1575.00 before I paid my assistant so let’s just subtract $212.50 from that to make it $1362.50. 

Had I not hired her, I would not have ever been able to maintain that volume of orders and would have burned out within a month or so. Because I hired her, I was able to take on even more orders, pay her even more money and grow my business. She was flexible and when things slowed down a bit, she had another part time job and it was a win-win situation for the both of us.

So, if you are afraid that hiring an assistant will cut into your profits I have some advice. Rather than focus on the money you will have to pay your assistant, do it like a true  Cookiepreneur  and focus on how much profit you will leave on the table if you decide not to hire her/him. 

That’s Called the Opportunity Cost of Capital by the way, and it means when making an investment decision, you look at how much you are going to leave on the table by not making that decision/investment v. how much it is going to cost you to actually do it you’re smart so I know you get the point! 

If you follow those three tips, you are off to a really good start about how to manage your time in order to make your Cookie Business a thriving success.  

In concluding today, I wanted to talk to you about a series of webinars and conference calls that l am going to host in the near future. 

Group Conference calls

Will be free of charge to everyone that is interested in participating. The only requirement will be for you to sign up so I know how many people are going to attend and these we are going to start offering once per month.

We will be discussing different topics and taking your questions beforehand, and answering them during the call. There will also be gifts and prizes for a winner chosen at random, after each call.

Cookiepreneur's Elite M2 Specialized Knowledge Webinars 

We are going to start offering a comprehensive webinar series on specific topics in the near future such as Comprehensive Cost Model Construction, Marketing, Branding, R&D etc.  Each one of these webinars will consist of two components. The Mechanics, and the Psychology of the Business of Cookies.  

These are going to be intensive elite level webinars that are intended for you, the most serious Cookiepreneurs that are truly want  to take your cookie business to that next level.

I will disclose upfront that  M2 Series of Specialized Knowledge Webinars will not be free of charge. I have invested countless hours on this comprehensive curriculum and am packing it full of every single morsel of information that I can possibly think of to help you surpass your wildest dreams and goals in this business.

Clearly, with something so intensive and involved,  there are certain costs involved that I must cover in order to host them, but what I can promise you is that 1. They will be incredibly affordable and give you MAJOR bang for your buck. 2.  We will go over the particulars of everything 3. You will have the option of adding personal email support from me. So there you have it!  

I want to give you ladies as much value as possible for your time.  My purpose is very clear, and that is to give you the tools you need in order to create your OWN recipe to success.

  

http://www.cookiepreneur.com

 Don't forget to sign up forour goodies and freebies  by clicking above in addition to  following our blog so that you don't miss out on all these special events .

Until next week , always remember what I know to be the absolute truth!

If you can see it, you can be it! Persistence is the key to success, never give up NEVER!

Wishing you an abundant and prosperous week.

Aymee    

Cookiepreneurship 101- Are you a Baker or a Cookiepreneur?

I sold my first cupcake in the 6^th grade and loved the feeling of earning money for myself.

It’s funny because as I got older, instead of trying to build my own business at an early age, I tried to play by the rules of society and do what I thought my parents expected of me.

I got a regular job, went to college, heck I even wanted to become an Attorney at some point and work for a big law firm somewhere, but somehow, on some level all of that felt wrong to me.

For the longest time, I have to admit I felt like a loser in the corporate world.  I knew I was bright, I tried my best to work well with others, but somehow, I just was not a fit.  I would either wind up getting bored or feeling restless within a couple of weeks.  If not ,I would find myself wanting to change the system around as soon as I learned it, I always thought I could teach my boss a thing or two about how they could make the system more efficient, sound familiar? 

I was bored out of my mind if my position did not entail mutli-tasking or doing something that was not tedious. I often got in trouble for speaking up “too much”.  One time I even had a boss tell me that he did not pay me to “think” he paid me to do as I was told, that should have clued me in.  

As I recall, even as I was working a regular 9-5 I was always trying different ventures on the side.  I would go to real-Estate Seminars, MLM campaigns, sold jewelry on the side, set up a catering business with my best friend at the time, you name it , I did it, looking back, I was always trying to get my own thing going on the side.   

I felt like a loser most of my adult life when I tried to work for others and never understood why. Thanks to one of the most successful copywriters of all time , I finally understood that I was not a failure or a weirdo when I watched him speak at the Attract Wealth Seminar in Austin Texas some years back. 

Remember those infomercials with the Blu-blocker sunglasses? 

Joe Sugarman, a seasoned businessman, BILLIONAIRE , President of the Blu-blocker Corporation and one of the most successful copywriters in American history was the one that opened my eyes to the fact that most Entrepreneurs don’t really easily fit in . We are a special breed of person that has many of the following characteristics.

*Creative – Thinks outside the box.

*Risk Taker- We often take risks most people are not even willing to consider.

*Confident – In spite of our flaws, we have an underlying confidence in ourselves.

*Become easily bored- Restless ;)

*Restless- Never quite satisfied, unquenchable thirst for growth and knowledge

*Perfectionist- Can tend to be a bit of a perfectionist.

*Generous- Generous on some level ( likes to share , give back or pay it forward)

* BOSS- I hate to admit this, but we do NOT like to take orders from others. Clearly most people do not, but for us it’s particularly painful.     

*Resilient- Bounces back like a rubber ball after each failure. Turns lemons into lemon cookies.

*Optimistic- In spite of a grim outlook, we tend to remain optimistic.

*Visionary- See opportunity where others do not.

*Unrelenting drive to succeed- You do NOT know the meaning of the word Failure.

Okay, so by now you get the idea right? Can you relate to this on any level?   

I have a sneaking suspicion that most of you who are reading this, can in fact relate to most, if not all of the aforementioned characteristics.  If not you may be asking yourself, well what’s the big deal? Why do I need to be like this in order to run a cookie business? After all, all it takes is a bit of talent as a baker and cookie designer/decorator… WRONG! I say, and I will tell you why.

You may in fact, have an amazing set of hands and be Sylvia Weinstock of cookies, and you already have the creativity part down, but if you do not start to develop some of these characteristics, particularly, optimism, resilience, and an unrelenting drive to succeed it will be very difficult for you to navigate the business of cookies, or most any other business.

Some people believe that you are born with these, I believe that they can be learned !

In order to survive and succeed in this business, at times you will have to be one tough cookie (pun intended), in order not to throw in the towel.  Running a small business, particularly while managing a family/household and working a full or other part time job requires an unwavering drive and focus that not everyone possesses.

This business may be sweet, but it is not for wimps.  This may sound harsh but I have learned that in order succeed in business you need to have the right mindset, otherwise you will be ready to throw in the towel the first time you burn 200 cookies or one of your cakes falls apart in transit.  I am here to make sure that does not happen to you (Not the cake and cookies, that, I’m afraid is inevitable, I mean the quitting part)       

Okay, so suppose, you feel this is just not you, or you don’t want to deal with the business end of this. Hey that’s fine, in that case either capitalize on your skills and go work for someone who will pay you a generous salary (That will be a future post about learning to price your cookies properly) or have your spouse, partner, friend or whomever else run the business end  for you. You can bake, be creative and leave everything else up to them.

So ladies, in short I will admit it, I am an unapologetic champion for female entrepreneurs everywhere. We are the champions of society, we do it all, with love, compassion, dedication, drive and fearlessness so kudos to you, my fellow Jean D’arc’s of Cookies! I celebrate you for being the few, fearless females out there, changing the world one cookie at a time. 

See you next week when we will start to discuss a bit of the mechanics of what makes for an amazing cookie business that stands out among the rest.

Again, if you have any general questions please feel free to email me at cookiepreneur@gmail.com or leave your questions in the comment section. 

I would love to hear from you, Let me know when you first discovered that you were a Cookiepreneur?

Always remember, If you can see it, you can be it! Never give up, NEVER!

Aymee   

The Journey Begins

Finally, I have been chomping at the bit for over a year now to get this blog started.  Those of you who already know me , are well aware that I have been excited about this project for quite a while.

At long last , I am able to dedicate the necessary time and energy to, hopefully make this a place that you can come to that is filled with information about a. How you can get your cookie business off the ground or b. how you can take what you already have to the next level.

Okay so listen up ladies, before we begin, I have to be honest with you, and I want you to know exactly what you can expect from this blog.  I value your time , and I want you to get the most out of this. I also want you to know a bit about me as a person .  I don’t know about you, but I like to know who I am listening to and why I should listen. I don’t take anything for granted. 

My intention as I stated before is to share a wealth of information with you about how to grow your business. Now that  means different things to different people.  In other words, some of you may think the information I will provide is all about the mechanics of how to start a small business from home, but that's not what this blog is all about.  Sure, there will be some of that  but let me tell you exactlly  how I intend to help you grow  or start your business.

Before we begin this journey together, I want you to know a little about my story.  I will not bore you with the long protracted version of woe is me, because it’s not, but I can tell you this.

My  Dark Night

Before I started baking and decorating cookies for a living, which quite frankly, I would have never imagined,doing a few years ago, I went through what many call MY personal Dark Night of the Soul.

I am going to throw around some figures here, not to brag about what I had,  but so that you can fully comprehend the magnitude of what I went through, and how far I fell. 

Within the a period of a single year I found myself in a position where I was forced to sell my interests in a very lucrative Mortgage Business that I co-founded . My five figure monthly  income vanished, overnight.   My husband of 8 years left me for another woman.  I was left with a three year old child, a $4500 dollar per month mortgage payment, a $1100 per month car payment, three properties and two elderly parents. One an ailing mother ( Alzheimer’s) that died soon thereafter and the string of unfortunate events continued for two years, until they finally culminated in me losing everything except my son and my sanity. It was a period of three years that I do not wish on even the most evil person on earth.

The Decision 

As I  look back on as the greatest period of Creative Destruction I have sustained, there was an immense amount of growth for me both spiritual and as an Entrepreneur.  I am the kind of person who has never accepted defeat and therefore I decided that if this was happening to me, I was going to give it a purpose, and use it to serve me, and others In the future.

It's not what life throws at you, it's how you handle it that counts and determines your destiny.

The Comeback

From an early age, 16 or so, I have  been fascinated by the subjects of Psychology and Personal Development. I always loved people like Tony Robbins, Dr. Wayne Dyer and Louise L. Hay. I read their books, and studied them. I  wondered how these people had turned their lives around so dramatically after such devastating failures, setbacks and horrible circumstances

Over the years I had taken many Psychology courses both in college and invested thousands upon thousands of dollars in books, seminars and have an extensive education in Personal Development, Entrepreneurship, Influence  NLP and like subjects in addition to attending Business School for a year where I completed coursework in  Leadership Theory, Economics, International Business, Marketing and other subjects relevant to Entrepreneurship .   

It had been a few years since I had not done any heavy  work on the Personal Development related subjects, and somehow when I took an inventory of everything that happened to me, I decided that it was time for me to dive back in and search within , to uncover what was going on inside of me, rather than continue to look outside for those answers.   

I have read about countless successful entrepreneurs that have been financially devastated only to rise from the ashes once again.  I wanted to learn for myself, how I could apply all of these theories so that I could handle all of this without losing my mind,  and not just survive it, but learn from it , grow stronger and share what I have learned with others.

As you all now know, I did make it through that period of time in my life, and reinvented myself as a Baker/Cookie decorator.  I am not yet a mogul by societal standards, but I can now support my household on my own if need be.

I can tell you that my first year I invested about $800. That’s all I had to start with , no more.

My second year I think I made about $250, the third I made about $12,000, the fourth $74,000 and projections are for over 100K for year number 5 in spite of a recent setback.

That kind of money is certainly not a fortune to some, but for someone who is looking to build a business  produces extra income without having to leave their home too much ( Except when you have to rent out a commercial kitchen for large orders) that’s not too bad, in fact it’s about 30-40K more money than most middle class Americans bring home if not more.

It's enough , if using it as a second household income to send your kid to private school, or pay for your child's college tuition ( At least part of it depending on where they go) .

 I am here to teach you how to become independent and build real businesses.  I am an open book and if you are going to listen to what I have to say, then you should know that you are hearing someone who knows what they are talking about, and someone who is going to be able to teach you to do the same thing
and hopefully exceed those numbers.

There are far too many phonies out there lying about how they made 50K their first year working from home, honestly, I have never seen that happen in this business and it takes hard , constant and steady work to build a cookie business, Any business for that matter, anything else is a lie or a blatant exaggeration, plain and simple . 

I have been to what I consider the depths of hell and back and learned that  there is no growth without resistance.  As many of you already know , being a Cookiepreneur is filled with resistance on many fronts that we will get into at a later time. 

Focus of this Blog

In short what My blog will focus on is sharing much of what I have learned both through my studies and my personal experiences, my triumphs and failures and what  I consider to be the two main components of successful entrepreneurship.

Component I (MECHANICS)- The Outer game

This is the component of success that  most people are familiar with are the technical in’s and out’s of running a business such as having : A good business plan, a solid costing model in place, great products that stand out among your peers, great marketing strategies, great networking, understanding basic business principles such as  ROI ( Return on investment) and the like, I'm sure you get the point.

Component II ( MINDSET) -The Inner game 

This is the remaining  80% of , which is actually the most important part in both your life as an entrepreneur and your life in general . The inner game is your psychology or mindset and that is what is going to determine the following: How you handle failure and how quickly you can bounce back,  how you deal with difficult clients, how you determine the value of your work, and not feel guilty about charging what it's truly worth,  how you feel about yourself as a business person , how you react to people who do not appreciate your work , how you treat your peers and others, whether you are confident in your work or always trying to hide, whether or not you feel deserving of your success. All these things, if not fine tuned are ultimately are going to bleed into the mechanics of your business and affect your overall ability to earn money through doing what you love.

Think of  mindset  as the soil in which you grow a plant, if it is not fertilized properly, a plant will not grow or reach its full potential. Mechanics is the actual plant.

We will absolutely be discussing some of the MECHANICAL  aspects of the Cookie Business, we will mostly discuss the MINDSET aspects that will prepare you to build a cookie empire if that is what you wish to do, which brings me to the last point of disclosure that I wish to make.

I admit it !

I like baking cookies, I love decorating them.  For me, it’s like therapy and I love the fact that I can play with flour and sugar and have something so beautiful that families share on special occasions. Creating a cookie business has allowed me to discover a talent I never knew I had, to cultivate it and to grow from it.  It helped me get back on my feet financially after a complete holocaust and I continue to run my cookie business and am happy to do it however, life is about growth and I feel myself evolving into a new role.

I must make this confession to you.  My true passion, what keeps me up at night ( in a good way) , what makes me light up like a Christmas tree, is sharing what I have learned with you. So you see, this is a dream for me, and I greatly look forward to serving you in any way that I can.  I look forward to hearing from you.  I will post weekly in the beginning stages and  and as Cookiepreneur evolves and grows, we will have more discussions and I plan to hold conference calls, post videos, and even have live, in person conferences where we can all meet up.

Thank you ladies (And any gentlemen as well) for all of the inspiration you have given me to start these conversations . I will close with my personal philosophy of life.

Persistence is the greatest Key to Success! If you can see it, you can be it! Never, give up ! Never!

Aymee  

p.s If  you have any  general questions or think of a subject you would like me to touch on, please feel free to email me at Cookiepreneur@gmail.com