Apples, Oprahs and the White House

Ever have one of those days where you think, hmmm, I'd like to fly to the moon, course you have no idea how you are going to get there but you know you’d like to go. Then the next day a space ship shows up. I mean seriously.

I just returned from a 10 city tour in roughly three weeks. Toward the end of my travels, I visited my friend Michael’s office in New York, on Madison Ave—Chiat Day. An ad agency, I’d never heard of them, they rep a little company called APPLE along with a few other tiny brands. It wasn’t so much the big brands recognition that impressed me, their office IS the set right out of the movie I am directing in New York. I’ve been seeing this place in my minds eye for the past 4 years and here I am in it. And now being the filmmaker AND entrepreneur, I also have a wild hair about wanting to create some sort of marriage for My Story as well.

Now, I must rewind to the 2nd city in my tour, Minneapolis, where I was flown by Deluxe Corp to begin this year long Marketing Lab, Project Rev co sponsored by SCORE, where I meet Mark Debosz, head of the Score Foundation, who offers me a job on the spot to create a video for their Big Awards Gala in September in DC for all their major sponsors American Express, Deluxe, Walmart.

Back to Chiat Day and my trip to the moon. I return from 10 city whirlwind to book the interviews for the SCORE video. And guess who gets handed to me on a silver platter not more than 3 days after my NYC Madison Ave visit---the former president and worldwide account director of Chiat Day, Tom Patty. Oh, just you wait, it gets even better…

Tom is the counselor to Morgan Smith, co owner of Boneheads Restaurant (tune into their MyStory film to hear how they came up with the name). Without question, these men are two of the coolest dudes you could ever meet. I wanted to listen to them talk shop all day, talking marketing in terms that even this newbie can comprehend. And they certainly didn’t need any direction from me, they were on a roll.

Morgan is a smart, giving, in tune business man who is so genuine and kind you want to either kiss or pinch him to be sure he is real. And Tom is one of those humble genius’ so rare, you can only hope some of his brilliance will rub off on you just by being in his presence. During our interview, alright lets admit it, the second I found out I was going to meet Tom, I was plotting just the right moment I would kindly convince him that he must mentor me.

We finish the interview, he sees the book I am reading in my bag The Starbucks Experience and says “oh you are serious about this entrepreneur thing?” I tell him a bit about my hopes and desires for My Story and without skipping a beat he throws out “I need to to mentor you.” (not a question, as if it is already done). I exclaim, “Tom you took my line!”

And our day has only begun. It is only 10am when we leave Boneheads with delicious, fresh, oh so yummy food in hand, to head over to Wildflower Linens to meet the owner Youngsong Martin and her mentor Terri Carr.

Youngsong creates the most breathtaking table linens you have ever laid eyes on. She has revolutionized the way party décor is done. She is a 5’ ball of fire, brimming over with so much passion and zest, I could hardly believe my good fortune, and twice in one day. No white polyester linens for this Korean emigrant who started her career in fashion, it is couture all the way. Don’t worry about spilling red wine, blood, ink or anything else on her ready for the runway fabrics, she's created a business within a business, specialized non toxic, green, dry cleaning to get out any stain.

In 7 years of working with Terri, a maverick in her own right (featured in the a new book Women of True Grit), Young and Terri’s collaboration has launched Wildflower Linens as the go to place for Oprah, the Emmy’s, the Golden Globes, the Oscars and now THE White House. We say THE White House because Young tells a funny story about when THE White House called she didn’t believe it was really THE White House, she thought it was a joke. No laughing matter when Lady Obama herself wants to see Young’s linens. She’s a huge fan.

Seriously, pinch me.

Please share your own game changing revolutionary days.

Project Rev (and MyStory) in the news

From my new friends at Deluxe Corp:

It's been an exciting week at Deluxe. We sent out a well-received news release about Project REV that named the winners. So far, the release has been picked up by 224 news agencies such as Market Watch, Fox Business News, Marketing and Advertising Industry Today, multiple local business journals and more than 50 television affiliates in cities across the country. The total daily audience reach is 118.9 million.

83 tweets and retweets about Project REV have been posted to Twitter. If you total the followers for each individual who posted a message, 399,405 people have been exposed to your message. Several of the REV participants tweeted the announcement as well.

Here is the URL of one of the postings of the release: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Deluxe-Corp-Selects-prnews-2322792745.html?x=0&.v=1

No longer a Blogging Virgin

Blog Post #3.

Thank God I got that out of the way. What once I was so resistant about, may now be growing on me. Wanna know why???? (Can you see me doing a little dance….)

I finally have something to blog about!!

So, I had this little idea for a business, enter Amy Swift Crosby and the super badass babes of SMARTY a networking group of female entrepreneurs. To be fair it is SO much more than a networking group—community, education, resources, accountability. Without Amy and this group, I certainly would not be writing this bog. I would still be talking about this idea at parties with responses like “cool idea, you should do that!” My super fly reply would be: “Yeah, well what do I know about starting a business?”

Now, I’m getting my street MBA from the ladies at SMARTY. Nine months ago, I didn’t know what the word monetize meant (make money), what a VA did (virtual assistant) and I am still wrapping my brain around how I provide ROI (return on investment). And I am from a family of business owners!! I’m the one at the dinner table asking my uber successful self-made brother to stop talking about marketing because he is making my brain hurt. Really.

Fast forward to last week when I get a call from Deluxe, you know the people who make your checks, apparently, my little yet to be launched company, MyStory, Inc, was selected to participate in this marketing collaborative called Project Rev. I applied months ago when I heard about it through my business coach Whitney Roberts. The application was so cake, I completely forgot I applied (which tends to happen as an independent filmmaker, self induced amnesia to ward off disappointment). No long essay to convince them why I’m a rock star or why MyStory deserves thousands of dollars in free marketing for a year.

Just simply tell us what you do and tell us your website so we can see for ourselves.

Now, they are flying me out to their headquarters in Minneapolis to get started and they want to know what my preferred beverage of choice is in the morning AND in the afternoon.

Who’s the rock star now? It’s the little things.

Stay tuned… Christmas dinner this year is going to be very interesting.