Reverend Horton Heat tearing the roof off early in show with “The Party in Your Head.”
Later in the evening they slowed things down to play some requests like “Where in the hell did you go with my toothbrush.”
This was one of the best shows I’ve seen in a long time. My son Mars is a huge fan and was at first super-excited when he found out Reverend Horton Heat was coming to The Orange Peel, then distraught when he saw it was not all ages. I convinced him to start contacting people, which led to him eventually to Bigsy of the RHH road crew. Bigsy made sure we could get in, and for that he will always be the man.
The whole show was great. One highlight was that it was Jimbo’s birthday. Road crew member Hoss brought a cake on stage, then after the candles were out proceeded to sing Motorhead’s “Ace of Spades” while Horton Heat shredded. Well done Hoss! I started to record that too but the crowd got to moshing and we were in the middle of it.
Jim Heath, the Reverend and Jimbo hung out after the show and Mars was able to get their autographs and chat briefly. They have had a huge influence on him and are the reason he has mowed a lot of grass to get a hollow body guitar, and he now has an upright bass in his sights. I had printed the email from Bigsy, because I wanted to be sure I could get the boy in, and Mars got it autographed by Jim and Jimbo.
Tonight I was on a bike ride with my pal Brian and we came across this family of bears. Bent Tree Rd is a popular route for cyclists, and apparently black bears. Undeterred, we followed this mother and her cubs until they scrambled up the bank, and then finished our ride.
We also saw two white squirrels in the same area. Nuts!
Detail of patch pocket. Two rows of topstitching for looks and avoiding slip stitching.
Mary has just started her new blog for sewing and all things related to fabric and fiber. In addition to posting projects there will be all sorts of tips and how-to stuff, and a lot of it will be in video form.
The blog design work hasn’t been done yet, but she’s not letting that stop her. I’ll feature some of the projects here too.
If you want to make your business competition irrelevant you will need to pursue a Blue Ocean Strategy. Creating something innovative in a market is not the easiest thing to do. If it were someone in your space would already be doing it. As Dharmesh Shah of HubSpot pointed out when he commented on a previous post, sometimes Red Oceans seem more attractive because there are established markets, pricing, etc. If you want to go Blue it’s going to take some real effort.
The authors of Blue Ocean Strategy (BOS) elaborate on six paths to reconstruct market boundaries and break out of red oceans. The first is to “look across alternative industries.” There is a difference between substitutes and alternatives. Read the rest of this entry »
It’s hot rod weekend! Mars and I went to Sonic Friday night, spent all day at Heavy Rebel Weekender in Winston Salem, then today we checked out the end of car show at the Ag Center (lame). Heavy Rebel Weekender was super fun. I was there mostly for the hot rods, Mars mostly for the rockabilly, and we both got our fill of each.
I don’t think I’ve seen ever so much pommade, ear gauges, and neck tattoos in one place. Some of those things aren’t exactly “era correct” but when the third wave of rockabilly mixes with punk rock and hot rod car culture (the automotive version of punk rock) things get crazy. Here are some pics and videos.
Rockabilly and mud wrestling behind us. Remind me to shave before hitting the road next time.
Below is 1932 Chevy Roadster Pickup Hot Rod. (Didn’t get to talk to the owner/builder. Interesting ride.)
Slammed Model A Tudor and Clint Bowyer’s 1934 Chevy hot rod (I’ve seen Bowyer’s ride in Rodders Journal. Nice to see it in person.)
T bucket hot rod (Love the paint. One of my favorite cars at the show. Saw it in Street Rodder April 2011.)
1927 Chrysler Roadster (I got to talk to Larry Shoaf owner of Rod Crafters. This car was featured in Street Rodder October 2009. Great to see it in person. Build quality is extremely high.)
The Buzzards playing outside at Heavy Rebel Weekender 2011 (While mud wrestling is taking place…)
The Hollowbody Hellraisers (One of the better bands we got to see. Too loud for the mic on this camera…)
It’s lonely at the top. Just ask John Warrillow. He’s built and sold four businesses. An advisory board can provide support in a number of ways.
In a previous article about building a sellable business I mentioned Warrillow’s book Built to Sell and that I had an upcoming conference call with him. I said I would report back and below is a transcript of his answer to my question about advisory boards.
Could fixing one “minor” bottleneck in your business double your revenue?
What’s the goal of any business? It’s to make money now and into the future. Every business has at least one bottleneck or constraint affecting its ability to reach that goal.
The Theory of Constraints (TOC) was created by Eli Goldratt and popularized by his book The Goal. One of the big ideas in The Goal is that your organization is a system with many interdependent parts. Suboptimal performance in one area can have a huge impact on the entire business. Focus on removing the bottlenecks to improve the overall performance of your organization.
One of my favorites quotes from The Goal is when the mentor character Jonah tells our hero, plant manager Alex, “we are not concerned with local optimums.” Say what? That phrase means that just because there are areas of your process, your business, that could be improved or optimized, doesn’t mean they should be. Are they constraints? If the answer is no, then those “local areas” are not the problem, and making them work better will not move you toward your goal.
“We should be trying to optimize the whole system. Some resources have to have more capacity than others. The ones at the end of the line should have more than the ones at the beginning–sometimes a lot more.”
Theory of Constraints can be rather complicated to implement, but I find it helpful just to be aware how constraints can affect the whole. The five basic steps are: Read the rest of this entry »
Would anyone in their right mind consider buying your business if you wanted to sell it? Would they still buy it if you were not going to be a part of the package?
Probably not, unless you’ve managed to build a business that can thrive without you. Some would say that until your business can run without you that you just have a job, not a business, with the worst possible boss, yourself.
John Warrillow, author of Built to Sell, has started and exited four businesses and lived to tell about it. I became aware of Warrillow and Built to Sell in 2010 when the first edition of this book was published. Unfortunately, I didn’t get Built to Sell at that time because of a growing backlog of business books in my office. Fortunately, I did start to follow Warrillow’s blog and email newsletter. On an E-Myth podcast I heard Warrillow explain the three core tenets of creating a “sellable business.” The product must be: Read the rest of this entry »
“Focus, Divergence, and a Compelling Tagline. These three criteria guide companies in carrying out the process of reconstruction to arrive at a breakthrough in value both for buyers and for themselves.” – Blue Ocean Strategy
Last time I wrote about Blue Ocean Strategy I covered how the Eliminate-Reduce-Raise-Create framework can help companies develop a “value curve” on the “strategy canvas” that will differentiate them from Red Ocean competitors. Going through that process helps point out where you may be over-engineering your product (spending time and money on things customers don’t really care about) and how you can deliver more value at a lower cost.
Figuring that out for your business is a fantastic achievement, but, according to the authors, there are three more essential characteristics of a good strategy.
Focus
What were we talking about? Oh yeah… Let’s say we’re looking at a strategy canvas (see chart in post). The value curve, points plotted low-to-high for various competing factors such as price, convenience, selection, for a typical Red Ocean strategy would look relatively flat compare to a Blue Ocean. Essentially, Red Ocean companies are trying to compete on all the traditional factors and they end being middling on most.
Blue Ocean companies on the other hand will have a value curve that is radically unbalanced. Competing factors are either very high or very low.
The authors use Southwest Airlines as an example. Southwest focused on “friendly service, speed, and frequent departures” while most airlines tried to compete with meals, lounges, and other things customers don’t care about as much. As a result Southwest was able to lower prices and suddenly they were competing with car travel, not other airlines. Blue Ocean.
Divergence
If you are going for a Blue Ocean Strategy your value curve will diverge from the mainstream. You’ll become less average, and closer to unique or “differentiated.” Clearly focus helps here, as does eliminating and reducing the unwanted, and costly to produce factors. Probably even more important they create new buying factors where there is no competition. For example Southwest “pioneered point-to-point travel between midsize cities” no longer relying on the hub-and-spoke system.
Compelling Tagline
The authors point out that “a good strategy has a clear-cut and compelling tagline.” Oh man. This one can be tough, and it’s something few companies have even if their strategy deserves it. The authors suggest that Southwest could use “The Speed of a plane at the price of a car–whenever you need it.” What could other airlines say? “We’re like all the rest and our prices are high.”
There’s some homework for you, and us. Come up with a compelling, and authentic, tagline. If we can’t do that, maybe it’s time to go back to the strategy drawing board.
“Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” – Sun Tzu quotes (Chinese General and Author, b.500 BC)
Want to know what it's like to have brain surgery? Well here's the long version of my experience. Complete with pictures and videos! Read all about the Brain Surgery Experience.
