How to set up a shoe shop - in 753 easy steps

At least, that's what it feels like some days!! Recently a friend said something along the lines of '20% of the work comes from 80% of the items, and 80% of the work comes from the other 20%'. Or something along those lines. I was so focused on the 'big ticket' items like location (vitally important of course), arranging the lease, deciding on fit-out, finding suppliers etc. that I figured once I had these things ticked off my list, that it would almost be a breeze after that. But it's the myriad of 'smaller' tasks that threaten to overwhelm at times - decor, point of sale system, organising/storing stock, setting up a back room, pricing, ticketing, phone/internet lines, insurance, eftpos - the list goes on. And on. And on. And in the interests of getting the shop open this century and not have it turn out to be a very expensive pet project, I have now set a date which I HAVE to meet.

Wednesday 5th of May*. 2010. 10am.

Yep, that's it folks. The opening date. You'll know me. I'll be the one collapsed in a corner. But feel free to check out the fab shoes. Just do it quietly. :-)

* Apologies to those who saw the original date of Tuesday 4th May. Due to circumstances beyond my control I've had to push the date back one day.

The Glamazon 'pregnancy' continues...

This starting a shoe shop business is certainly proving to get pretty involved. And there I was thinking it was just about visiting a couple of shoe fairs, perhaps thumbing through some catalogues at my leisure whilst sipping a restorative glass of pinot noir. I plan to open end of April (although realistically it will probably be around 1st of May) and I'm STILL waiting on my floor to go in, shelving to be installed, bits and pieces of furniture and another 512 fit-outish things that need to go into the shop. Of course, this doesn't even include all the other exciting things like phone lines, insurance, boring, boring, boring but absolutely, vitally essential to running a proper business. Sigh. Might have to put down the glossy Glamazon shoe images every now and again to deal with the other realities.

Although it has to be said - when you're doing it for yourself, when it's your very own 'baby', it just doesn't seem as bad as having to do it for someone else. I guess in this way it's just like a real baby. :-)