Mike is joined by Alex Schlindwein, also known as Diamond Diaries, to discuss her recent decision to expand one of their retail locations to include an adjacent building. This decision is one that many successful jewelers have needed to make and it comes with a whole host of difficult subsequent decisions such as handling existing tenants, renovating the space, and the design for a "monument sign".
We hope to have this be a recurring story that In the Loupe listeners can follow along to as we document a store's expansion efforts! Stay tuned for follow ups later this year!
Send feedback or learn more about the podcast: punchmark.com/loupe
Learn about Punchmark's website platform: punchmark.com
Mike is joined by Alex Schlindwein, also known as Diamond Diaries, to discuss her recent decision to expand one of their retail locations to include an adjacent building. This decision is one that many successful jewelers have needed to make and it comes with a whole host of difficult subsequent decisions such as handling existing tenants, renovating the space, and the design for a "monument sign".
We hope to have this be a recurring story that In the Loupe listeners can follow along to as we document a store's expansion efforts! Stay tuned for follow ups later this year!
Send feedback or learn more about the podcast: punchmark.com/loupe
Learn about Punchmark's website platform: punchmark.com
Welcome back everybody to In the Loop. What is up everybody? My name is Michael Burpo. Thanks again for listening to In the Loop.
Speaker 1:This week I'm joined again by Alex Linwine, also known as Diamond Diaries, a recurring guest and co-owner of Key for Jewelers.
Speaker 1:And right now Key for Jewelers are undergoing an expansion effort and this is something I've wanted to document for a little while, because a lot of our listeners and retail jewelers that are Punch Marks clients sometimes go through these expansions and there's a lot of decisions that sometimes have to be made that you might not have any idea of until you actually are making those decisions. One of them, for example, is this monument sign that goes out front of the parking area that comes with this plot of land when you expand and own the building. It's super interesting the decisions that have to go under it and it's kind of I'm hoping to document it along the way over the next yeah, probably year and a half and sort of track what goes into expanding a store. I think it's a fun talk. I don't think anybody has ever done one of these podcasts before specific to the jewelry industry, so I hope that this illuminates something for you and maybe it inspires you to expand your store as well. Cheers everybody and enjoy the show.
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Speaker 1:And now back to the show. Welcome back everybody. I'm joined by Alex Shlinwine, also known as Diamond Diaries and co -owner of Key for Jewelers. How you doing today, Alex.
Speaker 2:I'm good, mike, how are you?
Speaker 1:I'm so excited to have you back First recording with you of 2024. We had you on as a recurring guest last year and we kind of covered a ton of stuff. But this week I'm so excited we're going to talk about a huge development at Key for Jewelers and kind of maybe like a story I sort of want to follow, maybe for the rest of this year or next year or whenever there's updates. Can you kind of let me know, or let the listeners know, what the big deal is at Key for Jewelers right now?
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh. Yeah, 2024 is our year, so there, this has been a project that's been in the works for probably 10 years, to be honest, but we finally acquired the building that is next to our Lutz location, and our Lutz location is the one that has Rolex and it's our higher volume store. Right now. We have two locations just for anyone that's not familiar with us and we have been literally just bursting at the seams at that store for a while now and just all on top of each other not enough room for everyone whatsoever.
Speaker 2:And we've we looked at a lot of different options. To be honest. We looked at even like new property and pieces of land and other buildings that were vacant because we knew we were going to need to do something. Eventually, we actually looked at adding a second story to our building, and that really wasn't plausible with the way that our building was constructed Originally. So this was really our only and best option for expanding and this building it makes like an L shape around our building, so it provides lots of opportunities for expansion and it's it's adding 7,000 square feet to our footprint. So it's it's a lot, so we're excited, yeah.
Speaker 1:With Julie stores there are. It's not just the showroom. One thing I've learned quite a bit of is that there's also a lot of backup house things. So you know offices and bench spaces and also vault spaces. Have you kind of thought at all yet about like kind of what the breakdown is going to be? Is it? Is it primarily show floor? Is it primarily backup house Like what's that look like?
Speaker 2:It's going to be a little bit of everything. You know, when you go to jewelry shows, we talk to other jewelers and sometimes we even get to go visit some of our friend's stores and you see things and you see things in in store magazine of like the cool stores and you get store envy from other people, and so things that we've seen that are definitely on our wish list are we would really like to have a walk in vault and that I just think would be so cool for us because I love the idea of you know, you just take the whole pad out, put it on like those baking rolling racks and you roll the whole thing into the safe at night and you're not having to pack like every individual item every day and night. It's less wear and tear on the jewelry and the displays, it's less man hours every week setting up and tearing down, and I just think it's a cool like added feature. So that's definitely on our wish list. Definitely, back office space is a must for us.
Speaker 2:We have one small office that we've had. We've had four people working in crammed in there for several years and it's like you literally can't even have a phone conversation. You have to walk out to get like, walk outside to talk on the phone, because everyone's always talking and you get sucked in and distracted and it just wasn't working for us anymore. And now we have we have three jewelers in that store. They're all on top of each other. In our shop we have 13 sales associates now they can't, all you know, fit in the break room at the same time. Like just so many different issues that the growth has brought us, which you know, it's good problems to have, but definitely we needed some solutions. And then, of course, we hope to expand our showroom as well. So there's there's lots of things we hope to accomplish with this.
Speaker 1:Like part of me is always thinking, oh, it's probably just better to have more display cases out. But then as soon as I hear people talk about business, they're like, well, that's actually not. Not really the case, Because there's, you know, you have your main one that you put your there, your best couple pieces in you have, and you kind of stack, rank them, and if you just keep adding more, a lot of the times you're not adding, like the highest, you know, visibility pieces into those spots. I guess you have to be a little bit strategic about it. But what I'm curious about is you said you've been talking about this for like 10 years. That's crazy. What is that conversation like? Because you're a co-owner along with your parents and this is a, you know, a generational business with you. But I kind of am curious are you weighing, I guess, the ROI, I'm sure, but also like how long it'll take to pay off? Like what is that conversation like for 10 years?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was a tough conversation. Luckily, like, my parents were just as curious about going down this road as I was, and actually they're the ones that really like started talking about this 10 years ago, you know, because I was probably still just getting out of college at that time. So, you know they they've thought about this too for a long time, but we did have to have the talks about how is this going to affect their ability to retire, how is this going to affect my future with the business? It is committing us to a lot more debt and you know we had to have those conversations of like are we sure this is what we really want? Because it's going to mean we're going to have to say no to other things for a while, and a lot of the stuff that I'm talking about like is going to be a long term plan.
Speaker 2:Everyone has been like oh, when's going to be the grand opening of the new building and when are you going to start tearing down walls, and when are you going to do this and do that? And we're like whoa, whoa, whoa. This is going to be like a 10 year project of really getting. I don't know, like, if we ever feel like we're finished with acclimating with this new space. I don't know, but it's not going to happen overnight and we don't want to rush it. We want to do it right and really make sure we're like using the space wisely too. We're at a little bit of a pause too, because there were some tenants renting out some of the spaces in the back part of the building and we didn't want to just, you know, kick everybody out with little notice. So we are allowing most of the tenants to stay for a year and then we'll acquire those areas. So it's going to be a process, for sure.
Speaker 2:But yeah, you know, I think me and my parents, we had to ultimately just talk about the pros and the cons and like it's one of those things you never really know if it's the right decision. You just have to like make a step, and I think we were all passionate enough about the goal that it was going to accomplish. It was tough too, because it's not one of those things that's necessarily going to like bring an ROI, you know it's. It's going to improve like our quality of life and our quality of work life, I guess, and just our atmosphere get us more organized.
Speaker 2:We also had, we were running out of like just places to store packaging and stuff, so just little things like that, that we're going to diminish some of the problems that we have day to day to, and just operations. Like we just want to scale everything and make sure that we get all the problems out of the way so we can work more efficiently to get to, to continue to grow as big as we can. So you know, look, eventually we're just like all right, well, we don't know, but we're going to just give it a shot, take you know, give it up to fate and let's see what happens.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because I remember I had a conversation, I think about two seasons ago or maybe it was even three, with Howie from Robert Earnjuler, one of our clients and they have. We were specifically talking about his expansion into a fifth location and I was like, okay, so what goes into that? And he was explaining to me like well, it's not just like you're going to add a fifth location and, as a result, you're going to have one fifth more business. He's like that's never how it works. You kind of have it scale up and you have to weigh additional advertising, but it's also going to be additional cost and I personally am just an anxious boy and I have a lot of.
Speaker 1:I'm very risk adverse when it comes to, especially when it comes to debt, and some people are the exact opposite. If you listen to any interview with anyone that's an ultra high wealth individual, you know like people that have a wealth of over $25 million, they're always talking about how debt is a good thing and like debt is one of those things that you can use to scale up businesses and you can be aggressive and you can make. You know high impact plays with the dollars but and debt is one of those things that's very surefire and I'm always like man. That is one of those things. I just don't have the appetite for it. But hearing that you guys, you know, did this very, I guess, conscientiously or like very directly, is so inspiring. I can only imagine what that conversation is like with not just your business partners but with your parents. Oh my gosh, that's got to be a crazy conversation to have.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is. Luckily I'm so blessed and like my parents are so open minded and they are really at that point where they know, like I'm the one that's going to be you know, not like that's going to be affected by this decision in the long run more than they will be, and so they really kind of ultimately left it up to me and you know they supported it and they support my decisions with how to use the space too. But I also still want them to be collaborative with me too. So we just make a good team, like it really just worked out so well.
Speaker 1:When you're talking about this with your employees. I know that you guys have always been very transparent with your employees and you kind of bring them on almost as like I guess teammates or team members, and we had a whole episode last year at the end of last season where we were talking about your guys is the key for conclave and the celebration you guys throw. If you don't mind me asking what is the kind of the transparency and like the vision building like with your employees.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I mean we want to know how they feel about stuff. I mean we didn't necessarily involve them a lot with the decision of buying the building, but we did inform them as soon as we could about it. And actually the seller of the building, she wanted to kind of keep it hush-hush as much as she could as long as she could. But we did tell our team sooner than that and just told them, like if you see her, don't say anything. You know, like play cool. And they were all like they loved that.
Speaker 2:And the day that we closed on the building, you know we did a little cheers with just the three of us but then we like immediately went over and brought pop champagne bottles with the whole team because like they're just as excited as we are and you know they're just as eager as we are to get in the space and use it. And it's fun to hear everyone's ideas. And I'm sure at some point we're gonna have like a big round table where it's like let's just throw all the wild ideas out there, throw a little whiteboard and see what sticks, you know a very Exciting moment and also to hear that you are growing.
Speaker 1:One of the things I've kind of solidified in my own mind with speaking with so many business owners over the years is that there's no such thing as Staying the same when it comes to business. You're either growing or you are shrinking. And knowing Kind of having like a milestone moment like this really solidifies that that growth mindset of we are doing big things and I I can only see how that would be, you know, an exciting kind of a positive thing to have going on at your business.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for sure. It's also a lot of pressure too, though, because it's like, okay, we're now operating under this idea that we're gonna keep growing, so we need to make sure we keep growing, which luckily, you know, that's all that's happened since, since we acquired this building, but luckily we're a very financial stable company. My dad has always been like so smart with all of it, and we have a lot of I don't know like Red flags, I guess, in place to you know that we can keep an eye on and know if we, if there's something going the wrong direction. We have safety nets in place too. So that's what made me feel good about moving forward with this expanding one location further is there?
Speaker 1:does this change anything for the Dade City location? So, like you mentioned, you have two different locations and the one in particular, the your Lutz location. Lutz location that one is your high volume carries, rolex. Does it change anything for the other location? Like, I assume that they're connected, but how much?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we do kind of treat the Lutz location as like our corporate headquarters too, if you will. So there's some admin roles that only Exist. You know one of those people in our company, but they do things for both stores and we're trying to move more towards Everything, like all the merchandise going to our Lutz location, getting checked in and processed there and then, if it needs to go to Dade City, just getting transferred over there from the Lutz location, but not having any merchandise actually arriving directly to the Dade City location and like same with like supplies and packaging. And then, like our bookkeeper, she does stuff for the books for both stores, obviously, but she's just got her office in Lutz, so just kind of easier for us to like have all of the main things where there's only one person doing that job, all close by together and then we can always, you know, get stuff over to Dade City as needed.
Speaker 1:So it's kind of like the Lutz location is going to be the almost like the warehouse or operations center, and then the other one is more of the satellite location. Very cool, I'm Businesses, I went to school for art, so I mean understanding this kind of stuff is definitely a little bit outside of my wheelhouse, but the more I learn about it, there is like strategy involved. So it's cool to hear.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:All right, everybody, we're gonna take a quick break and hear a word from our sponsor, yee-haw. Just kidding, that's so silly. Punchmark is gonna be that the IGL Dallas conference, from March 10th until March 12th, and if you haven't yet already, make sure you make an appointment and stop by and hear the latest and greatest about the punchmark platform. We've also got new digital marketing options for stores of any size. We're really excited to show them to you. Make sure you stop by and also mention that you love in the loop. It really makes me look good and you can do that. Just go to punchmarkcom, slash appointments or punchmarkcom, and in the top right book, my appointment. You'll see it very easy. Hopefully you see you guys out there and back to the show. And we're back now.
Speaker 1:I kind of want to talk about, like what goes into a move like this. So you guys are a decision like this, so you guys are discussing, talking about it. You guys, I'm sure, had to Talk to the banks and make sure that everything was squared away there. After that, then what you said you have about one year of having these tenants there and then deciding what you're going to do with that, and then is it? You start like having an architect come in and having to kind of work with someone to like Build the, the design, and then kind of it's all going to go from there, like what is the roadmap like for you in the short term?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's definitely the plan to eventually meet with an architect or, you know, a general contractor of some sort. We need to do the research to find the person we want to work with still, so we're definitely still at the ground level with all of that, but I would even like to talk to a couple and see, like you know, just what all the ideas are and just what's the path of least resistance for everything that we want to accomplish, cuz, you know they there's things with like, okay, we want to expand the shop, but they need water in the shop. So what's gonna be the easiest way to expand that while getting them the water access that they need and they need ventilation and you know. And then with connecting the buildings, how does that work security wise? Eventually we'll need to connect the two properties to.
Speaker 2:Actually, the first thing that we really am kind of one of the most immediate reasons to buy the building, was the fact that we wanted to get a monument sign out on the road.
Speaker 2:So the way that we we purchased the, the property that we, that we bought originally my dad, was like all I can afford is this little square of land, and it didn't actually include the parking lot around our store. So because he literally was maxing out what he could get at that point. And so he's like, well, I'm just gonna give up the parking lot. And so we don't own the frontage that is actually on the highway that we are on. So we could never have a True like monument sign for our business and obviously we've done well without it. But we feel like that could really help us get to the next level, because we still we've been here since 2006 and people still say They've lived here all their life and driven past our store and didn't know we were here. You know, and like I have a bunch of billboards I buy every year and I just think it would be super cool to be able to just have that going into something that we own and that we have more control over.
Speaker 2:So Monument sign not that I don't know but, Signs that you see out by the road, like sometimes, though, we're gonna get one with the LED digital display on it so that we can change it out with our you know, with our advertising and our events and things like that.
Speaker 2:But you know, like I'm sure you've seen them, sometimes for big Plazas they might have lots of squares on them for all the businesses in there, but we want one just dedicated to only us, you know. So, actually, I'm about to post a reel here in just a minute With the two designs that we have right now, and I want to get everyone's feedback on what their favorite is. That'll help you kind of visualize what I'm talking about. After I post this, and I guess, depending on when this episode airs, we might still be collecting some votes on that, because we have literally talked about this now for Months, like pretty much since we knew that we were buying the building and we are so torn on the design and it's a big decision, we're talking a lot of money and it's permanent, so we want to, like, do it right the first time, you know, but so we're doing that. We're super excited. So, yeah, stay tuned for that and check, go to my page to see the poll and I think that'll help you see what we're talking about.
Speaker 1:Like how you've been documenting it. It's. It's been very interesting to to follow the process. I'm getting Increasingly closer. I'm hoping next year will be the year I get to buy my first-ever house and that's one of those processes that, yeah, I had no idea how many steps there are in that and there's like these steps that surprise you and like even right down to the last second. And then I was talking to my friend, actually the Director of Education at punch mark, jason is. He's one of my best friends and he, when he bought his first house, he was like oh yeah, and then I signed papers for for two and a half hours. I was like what he said, like yeah, the, the final step is you have to just sign papers for Ever. And he was explaining like how there's so much, so many steps, so many steps up. Are there anything that like kind of surprised you with this like Beyond, just like getting the keys to the next phase?
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, it was such an ordeal. So yeah, with this, with this whole process at first we wanted to try to get an SBA loan to buy the building because, obviously, interest rates are not Low right now, and so that would have been a much more cost-effective way in the long run of us acquiring the building. However, there's a lot of red tape to get an SBA loan, especially for something like this. So we ended up hitting some road road bumps, speed bumps, and and they they send their appraiser out to do the appraisal on the on the building and they Super undervalued the building where and to the point where it was going to mean that we were going to have to come up with another like $800,000 cash to close. It's for the deposit, for the down payment, on top of what we were already trying to come up with. So that really was not going to work out. I mean, we could have come up with the cash, but it was really going to strap us, and this was all happening in December. So it's like this is not the time that we want to be like cash poor, you know. We need to be like reordering all the fast sellers and keeping the cases stocked, you know.
Speaker 2:So we ended up switching banks with about two weeks to closing, which was crazy. We found another local bank that was able to help us and they just really wanted to earn our business. They, of course, they want us to eventually start banking with them for all of our business needs. So we're going to slowly obviously switch over to them, but they made it happen. It was amazing and at the beginning we thought we wanted I didn't, I didn't need to be a part of the loan because I'm less than I think they say it was 20 percent. If you're 20 percent or more Ownership, your name needed to be on it and you need to also sign like a personal guarantee for it. But because I was under the 20 percent, I didn't really have to do it, but my parents kind of wanted me to and honestly, I kind of wanted to put some skin in the game too and just share the responsibility. You know. So with the first bank, we were going to have me involved with it and I was filling out all this paperwork too for me and my husband and all of our assets. But then when we switched banks in the final hour and it was just we were on crunch time. So we ended up leaving me out of it at the last second, which is fine. We can always go back and change it if we need to too, and obviously, once, like, I get over that 20 ownership, I think we'll have to change something anyways, which probably won't be that far away. But, um, yeah, so that there was lots of drama and we were sweating bullets all the way until closing day On whether or not it was all going to go through.
Speaker 2:So and then just like, getting inspections on all of the parts of the building and there was like two different types of inspections that we did and it did discover that there are some roof leaks. I mean, the building's like 20 years old at this point. So we're like okay, let's factor in that we're going to need to do a new roof in the near future. And you know, there were all those stopping points that were like, are we sure we want to do this? Like now you're talking, we're going to have to spend 50 grand on a roof at some point in the near future. So, but every time that we reconvened, we're like no, we got to do this, we got to do this. Like it is what it is, you know.
Speaker 1:A cool process, though, to to actually have to go through and you know, on the things go well. You ever have to do this again. It sounds like it's definitely will be even more straightforward the next time I hear that, like buying your first house is like a huge headache, but buying your second house is much, much more straightforward and you kind of know what to expect. I guess it's been really cool to hear about. And now that I've spoken with I talked to it through the Hills Jewelry a couple seasons ago where they were opening their first location ever and like what is the process behind that? I spoke with Howie about opening his fifth location and like expansion efforts and now hearing your experience of like expanding a store and what is that process, like that feels like I'm kind of learning more and more about what these businesses are like and like I have all these you know these questions I'm going to eventually have and I would love to be able to follow up with you on this and you know, either a couple months or a year when everything developed.
Speaker 1:For example, like what is it like building a new safe? I have a lot of questions about about vaults in general, and like what is that like? Because people don't want to talk about it very much for obvious security reasons, but at the same time, I assume that just about every single jewelry store has one, so it must have been figured out at this point. But I have all these questions when it comes to it. Like you know, are you able to go and tour a finished one, or they probably won't even let you do that. So it's it's been very cool to kind of follow along for you guys, yeah for sure.
Speaker 2:I know most stores would definitely let you check out their vault if you wanted to. Actually, I worked at a store in Tallahassee while I was in college called the Gem Collection, and the entire showroom was in a giant vault. The front and back doors of the building were vault doors and the entire showroom it had no windows and you know, it was like five foot thick concrete on all four sides and the entire showroom was a vault. He actually won like tons of design awards and stuff for this building. It was crazy and it's really cool how they did it and it was actually. I got so spoiled there because we didn't have to pull or set up jewelry ever because it all just we just walked out at the end of the day. So if you're ever in Tallahassee, go check that out because that's like the coolest you know version of a big vault that I've ever seen. Anyways.
Speaker 1:I had no idea until I started speaking with jewelers for this podcast that one of, like, the biggest parts of owning and operating a jewelry store is, yeah, having to pull and replace and move jewelry around at the beginning and end of every single day. And it's so funny as, like a customer, just I just assumed that you guys always just left it there, but I that is not the case. I've learned.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, not the case no.
Speaker 1:Now, Alex, maybe just teasing the next steps for this process, because the whole idea of this is like what can someone expect when going through, you know, an expansion effort? Would you know what the kind of the next, maybe couple of months are going to look like with regards to this expansion?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so for us, you know, our goals were to get the monument signed, so that's, you know, going to be a goal of ours Once we make a decision. It probably is going to take about six months, like door to door, to get the sign installed, but you know that's our first priority. And then I didn't talk about this yet, but one of the units is empty already. The tenant just decided to go ahead and move out and so we've been cleaning out that space. It was kind of a disaster because he was it was very random, but he was a saxophone repair person and I guess that requires a lot of chemicals and the chemicals had, like, ruined the carpet. The place smelled disgusting. So we had to basically gut that unit and start over and paint and we ripped the carpet out.
Speaker 2:So that is now storage for our packaging and we're getting a system put together. We just found that when we do less for just do one packaging order a year, but one very large order we could save a lot of money because you know most of our packaging it is made overseas and there's tariffs and freight charges and obviously only having to do those once per year is way more cost effective for us. So we did one giant order. It came actually well, it came in kind of three smaller segments but it stopped at the warehouse in the US before it came to us. But it came on several pallets and it was quite a process unpacking it all. But we wanted it like organized and we actually inventory it, just like a rough count, and then we check out, you know, and we when we take packaging from that back supply so that we always know like when we're running low, because we've actually had years where we've gotten close to running out near Christmas or near a holiday and that is a very stressful problem to have in the jewelry business. So that was one of our, our first goals with all of this and then trying to get some of the admin and back office people over to the building will be our next step for this year and that's probably all we're really going to knock out, I would say, in this year and then, once the other tenants get out, we can make a plan for the future.
Speaker 2:But you know, anyone else thinking to go through this.
Speaker 2:I would just give some advice, like we did a lot of, you know, financial analysis before making the decision to and luckily we have a bookkeeper that is just a numbers wizard and she was actually able to do a forecast, using QuickBooks, on what our new expenses were going to be and what that was going to look like and how it would trickle down to the bottom line, and that's really what gave us confidence, you know, to to move forward with the decision.
Speaker 2:So I would definitely make sure to do your due diligence, ask lots of questions, think of all the worst case scenarios, run the numbers, run them forwards, backwards, upside down, and just make sure that, like you know, trust your gut at the end of it all, because that's really the thing that's gonna, you know, really count the most, because you make work, what you want to make work, too, is kind of my mindset. So if you, if it's not something you're excited about, you're not going to want to put energy into it and it's not going to be successful. But we were all like losing sleep over not doing it. So I think that was the ultimate decision factor for us.
Speaker 1:I'm excited. I can't wait to follow along. We'll kind of make this like a recurring segment. I don't know if anybody has ever listened to some of the old dim lit series. There's one that was called startup and it was all about the process of starting a startup, and I'm hoping that maybe we can have this be a you know, every six months or eight months kind of thing where you can check in with you, hear how things are going, you know, with the latest and and you know I'm sure there will be some challenges but also some successes. That'll make it all very worth it and we can kind of check in and hear how things are going.
Speaker 1:And I'll be seeing you actually in just a couple of months. We're going to be at the client workshop. I'm hoping to do another live in the loop recording. I'm not sure which topic we're going to cover yet, but I'm hoping we'll be together in in Charlotte. So I, if anybody is interested, it's going to be, I believe, april 28th through the 31st, so make sure you're on the lookout for that. We'll have a lot of advertisements for it on in the loop, so make sure you're staying tuned. Alex, is there anything else before we wrap this up that you'd like to to mention.
Speaker 2:I would just say if you are a punch mark client, you have to go to the client workshop like I, and I feel like pretty well versed in. You know all things website, e-commerce, social media but last year my mind was blown. I literally left with so many good takeaways and things that even after using the punch mark, you know back end for years and years and years. I learned so many things and it was even just fun like it's just fun talking to your rep face to face and meeting other jewelers that use the platform, and you know they showed other people's websites on the screen. And then I would go back and be like oh, can you make mine do that? Oh, I like that. Oh, can I, can I steal that feature too? You know, and you get to be the first to find out about any new features that they're rolling out to.
Speaker 1:But I even think I mean tell me if I'm wrong even if you're not a active punch mark client, you could go to the workshop right and ask questions, or, yep, I think I think just having that opportunity to sit down with your rep again, like you mentioned, it's so valuable just because it just makes communication easier in the future when you kind of like know the personality a little bit better.
Speaker 1:But also, I mean, we go to jewelry trade shows all the time or a lot of us do and when we're designing what the workshop is like, we we want the workshop to feel like a trade show. So, as a result, we build in a cocktail hour at the end of the first day. That's on a rooftop bar. It's really fun, and we have dinner and lunch catered and we tried to make it so that there is a lot of occasion to have that kind of, you know, in-road building that I think a lot of people really enjoy at trade shows, and the fact that it's not just people from one specific buying group, there's people from across it and also people not even in a buying group. I think it'll allow you to kind of cross pollinate and learn to learn something you might not have before for sure, I'm so excited that's where we'll call it.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much, alex. I'm really excited. I think it'll be a lot of fun to follow along. But everybody, we'll be back next week, tuesday, with another episode. Thanks everybody, bye. All right, everybody. That's it under the show. Thanks so much for listening. This episode was brought to you by punch mark and produced and hosted by me, michael Burpo. My guest this week was Alex Schoenlein, also known as Diamond Diary's co-owner of Kiefer Jewelers. This episode was edited by Paul Swares with music by Ross Cocker. Don't forget to rate the podcast on Apple Podcast. It's Spotify, best way to help us grow and leave feedback for us on punchmarkcom slash loop. That's L-O-U-P-E and let us know what you think of the show. Try to share it with one of your friends. Probably, uh, probably comes better. It's vouched from for you guys. All right, everybody. Thanks so much. We'll be back next week, tuesday, with another episode. Cheers, bye.