Idinraha unshackled...

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January 22, 2006

Retailing after 9/11, a new reality

Tuesday September eleven started for me just as another day. I got ready to go to work, I had slept late, so I was leaving the house later than usuall. I got in my car and turned on the Radio, listenning to Imus in the morning, as I do everyday on my way to work. I remember exactly where I was on Huntington street when I heard the news. My first thought was to remember where my kids and wife were at that moment. I knew the kids were at school, and my wife was on her way to the gym for her daily work out.

The first news that I had heard was that an airplane had hit one of the two towers . I thought to myself what a disaster, and felt happy that I don't fly often. Then the came the news of the second plane hitting the second tower, and by now I knew as many other people that this was more than an accident, and it was the work of the terrorists. I felt a certain shock and anger, knowing how the world as I knew it had just changed and it would never be the same.

Once I got to the store, I turned on the TV, and saw how the towers collapsed, one after another. It seemed unreal, my brain could not process what I was seeing as reality. It was more like a scene from another Arnold Schwatzeneger's movie. I immidiatley thought about John, and Kevin my friends. Kevin worked in Manhattan, and John was supposed to go to Manhattan that day. I called their wives and they both told me that John, and Kevin were allright and they had recieved calls from them. I then called my mother, since she would have known about the were abouts of my sibblings. She told me that every one was allright.

I went to the Gym that afternoon, trying to make up the session I had missed in the morning, I also knew I needed the work out to release some of the tension I felt after hearing the news, and watching it on TV. I remember I was on the treadmill, when the TV anchor reported how the firemen that morning went to the buildings after taking absoulotion and blessing from their priest, well knowing they will not survive. I stopped. I could not help the tears that welled my eyes, and cried.

I knew that my business would be effected by what happened, I had just put a new advertizing in the Westport Magazine. A full page, full color ad, showcasing a superior, collectible antique rug, priced at $ 175,000,00. It was a daring venture for me. You see after I separated from my father and brothers in 1993, and started my own business, I had decided to focus my business on fine antique rugs. There was not any other rugs outlet in Connecticut that mainly sold fine antique rugs. It was a risky venture, for you have to invest big capital and time to collect such pieces, and you also had to position yourself in the market with different style of Marketing, selling and advertizing.

It had taken me eight years to achieve that. By September 2001, I had moved to a location next to HAYDAY market, and my store had become a highly regarded retail outlet for patrons with discriminating taste and the discrisionary income to afford it. I had worked seven days a week, for the last eight years, with no vacations. I had used Westport, and Greenwich Magazine and Weston Magazine, as my main tools of marketing, displaying full page full color advertising of fine rugs. I had been also able to convince my customers to allow me to take a picture of the rugs they had purchaed in their houses, and showcase them in my advertising. I had made new connection in the suppliers market of fine antique rugs also, which had enabled my store to be one of the destinations for many antique rugs that were purchsed in Europe and were brought to United States.

I had solved the problem of capital for my purchases by making new connections with some of my wealthy customers, borrowing money from them and in some cases making them partners in purchases I made, halving the profit upon the sales of the rugs. They were happy since I was paying them higher than the market interest, and they were making good return on their investment. Jus the year before I had sold an antique Farahan of an impecable beaty 6X9 for $98,000.00 and another Antique Farahan 7X10 for over $ 75,000.00. An avarage customer would spend at least over fifty to seventy thousand for few rugs in my store, and I had customers that spend over half a million to furnish their houses with my rugs. The profit margins were healthy and my accountant was baffled by my good fortune. Again, this was product of senev days a week working habit and a sharp focus on the demographic of my market, with using the right advertising vehechle and a consistant quality in my advertising. I had never ran a Sale in the last five years, there were no Sale signs in my windows, and I had no price tags on my rugs. I had customers that would never ask for the price of rugs, they just chose what they liked and paid for it.

I knew that all of that would change, it was only the matter of time. But to my surprise I had a couple who came to my store, on the weekend after September 11, and asked to see the rug that I had advertised for $175,000.00. But that rug was never sold. It seemed the reality of 9/11 had not sank in people's mind yet. My business stayed the same, and by the end of 2001, my sales had increased another twenty percent.

I remember a week after 9/11, one of my brother in laws called me and told me, that I should shave my beard. with my dark hair, eyes , and a beard, I had a very ehnic look that could pass as a terrorist with right clothing. I laughed at him, and my looks never gave me any trouble during my trips to Manhathan to meet my suppliers.. Funny that the same brother in law that gave me the advise, and is usually clean shaven, was stopped behind the Loncoln Tunnel and his van was searched for a hour. I was once stopped entering D&D building and was asked for identification, which I obliged smiling. It took the war in Afghanistan, and then the war in Iraq before I felt the effect of 9/11, and the new realities of life on my business.

By the March of 2003 my sales nose dived, and it was off to the tune of 60%. That was also the result at the year end. my total sales were 60% off from the year before. My other collegues, my brother and brother in laws that also are involved in the same business, but their main stay is much lower priced rugs did not suffer. I tried to stay the course, I had amased a huge inventory, and I had to pay my suppliers, so they would keep me in good terms. I had to raise cash, but this time I had to come up with my own money. An injection of $ 250,000.00 cash by borrowing against the rental house I have, helped me to get through the 2004. I had cut cost any way I could. at work and at my household. But the sales were still falling and at many occasions I thought that I might have to close shop and look for employment elsewhere. The problem was my inventory. I had focused so much on my purchases of antique rugs, and had reffered so many of customers that were looking for new rugs to my brother in law, and my other competitors that i had not had many new customers. I had to change my inventory.

In December 2004 I was sitting in my family room when my seven years old daughter Kiana, came to me. she informed me that she has a new business now and her new job was to be a consultant for any problems people might have. She asked me if I had any immidiate problem that she could help me with. I said yes , I have business problems. She asked me to explain, and I told her about my declining sales. She told me that she would have a solution for me tommorow and I have to pay her seven dollars for her wisdom. I did. The next evening when I got home, she gave me a refference card, on the card there was her solution. PUT SALES AND CLEARANCE SIGN IN YOUR STORE WINDOWS, AND ADVERTISE. I was surprised, her suggestion seemed well thought of and logical. I asked my wife if she had put her up to it, but she didn't have anything to do with it.

The next morning, I woke up thinking, that she made sense. Once I got to the store, I ordered five large SALE and CLEARANCE sign, and within two days I had them up in the windows, and one by the road side. That weekend I did some good business, I had brought down the prices and many of my old antiques and my first customer was a gentleman who had visited me a few times before, eyeing a beautifull antique Mashad runner, and he bought the piece at half the price he was quated before. The new sales allowed me to change my inventory little by little. I set up a rack sample of new rugs. Purchased samples from a supplier of Tebatan rugs, and some Indian and Peshawar rugs. Since then my business has estabilised more. I have been selling most of my collection of fine rugs and replaced them with more up todate designs and colors in new rugs.

I think some of the reasons for the decline in my old business has been that americans have been exposed to the rest of the world and its problems more than ever and it has effected their spyche to some extent. None of us feel as safe and as rich as we all did brfore 9/11. The low interest rates have also had their effects. More and more people have purchased many large houses in the Fairfield County and they are HOUSE POOR, with no money left to furnish inside their houses. The eocnomy is good, the war has become a fact of our every day life, and the uncertainty of geo politics have lost some of their luster. I do not have a collection of very fine antique rugs any more, and have become just another rug dealer, seeling new rugs, but I am still here, and my business is doing okay.

Posted by Idinraha at January 22, 2006 12:12 PM

Comments

Posted by: cycho at January 24, 2006 10:28 AM

Posted by: LiveLife at January 24, 2006 02:10 PM

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