The Emotional Journey That Lead to This Video
Posted by Keith Eddleman on
The Dallas Market Center Experience
This past October we purchased a booth and attended the Women's Apparel and Accessories show in Dallas. It was a mind-expanding, learning experience. If a little brain-stretch was the only thing we got from it then we would still deem it a huge success. But we got so much more than that. We overcame the fear and uncertainty of something totally new. We made friends. We got leads and of course we signed on a few new accounts; Awesome! How did we do it? What did it take to get there, be there and succeed there for our first-time-ever? It took a journey. Here's how we did it.
It started in July. We had set a goal of being in 100 boutiques by the end of 2019. Ambitious goal, of course, but that's how we like to operate. A goal that big required that we go above and beyond and push ourselves to learn things we had never learned before. We called on my old friend Cole Daugherty from high school. He happens to be the VP of Marketing at the Dallas Market Center. Jill and I had a conference call with him in early July.
Leading up to our call with Cole, Jill and I brainstormed questions that we wanted to ask him. On the call we covered a lot of great information. Cole was kind, calm and knowledgeable, completely opposite to the way Jill and I felt. We were excited, caffeinated and ignorant. Coming off of the call and taking Cole's advice we decided that it would be best to simply attend the August show and not pay for a booth. We would walk the aisles, meet some people, get booth ideas and break the ice. This would be a one hundred percent learning experience.
The Learning Trip in August Video Documentary
On the way to 'observe and learn' in August we decided to document the journey. We took a bunch of videos, but this one is the best. It provides a recap of the first day. We were toast! Super tired and enjoying our complementary class of rose while we rested our feet!
As you could see we learned a lot. We were excited. We had to wait a full 2 months to actually have our own booth at the show, but there was a lot of work ahead. The video tells the story, so I won't type out the content.
We made it to the show and then this happened...
The real reality of WHY we were there hit us. At the end of all the preparation, literally 10 minutes before Buyers filled the aisles of the market we realized that we were there for Brynn. Plain and simple the truth in our hearts emerged like the tears in our eyes. We do this to honor Brynn's legacy.
(If you're interested to see more videos on the Dallas Market Center Experience or if you have ideas for my blog let me know.)