A request for the business types

I've got a request (plea, beg, implore) for anyone who understands how business works.  On my other blog (A Valdese Store) I wrote about my confusion when it comes to crunching numbers business wise.  That is because I have no kind of business education - none at all.  I can tell you we make money, & a track a lot of things just to make sure it's profitable, but that's about it.

So I was wondering if someone who actually knows something about business could take a look at what I wrote tell me if it's good or not so good.  You can get there by clicking here.

Now understand, this is not a big business we've got going.  It provides extra money, just enough to stave off the day when one of us (I vote Patti Anne) may have to get a real job, and that's all I ask of it.   We do put quite a bit of time and effort into it though.  But it doesn't warrant a whole heck of a lot of professional analysis. 

Thanks in advance.

10 Observations About My Blogging Experience

I've been doing this for a while so I ought to be able to come up with 10 observations about Blogging.  I'm thinking these up as I type, so here goes.
1.  I have no problems with Entre-Card.  They can do what ever they want, I don't care.   I've visited more blogs than I would have without them, and certainly my blog has been seen by more people than it otherwise would have been.   
2. I'm not trying to make money by blogging.  If you don't believe me, take a look at my blog.
3.  Sexually suggestive pictures on the EC widget frequently irritate me.  Not because I have anything against sexually suggestive pictures on an EC widget, but because when I click on them, they usually link to a business oriented blog.  I find the false advertising irritating.
4.  I (almost always) read the blogs I drop on.  So if I've dropped on your blog & your latest entry has changed, I almost certainly read it.
5.  I've found I'm drawn to different types of blogs.  I like blogs people write about what's going on in their lives, because I'm drawn to the minutiae &  routines of it all, and the similarities and differences to what I've experienced.  I also like blogs about life in other countries - I've been exposed to a lot of different cultures in my life (some more than others), and it just seems natural that I'm drawn to it.  Also humor blogs, the occasional pet blog & writing blogs.
6.  Just because I drop on your blog, does not mean I agree with it or endorse it.  There  are people out there with very strong opinions about this or that, ESPECIALLY politics. No one should try to recruit me to the cause just because I dropped on a blog.  All a drop from me means is that (usually), I've read your latest & greatest post.  Don't draw any other conclusion than that.
7.  I rarely comment.  I suppose this is a failing of mine, and I should try to do better.  But I just don't comment very much.  I like receiving comments as much as the next person, so I should do better.
8.   To date, I haven't participated in any organized blogging activity.  This includes the well intentioned but mind boggling "Wordless Wednesday".  Nothing seems so odd to me as a Wordless Wednesday posting with a bunch of words describing the picture.  I see that over and over, and to me, it's just wrong.  Maybe I'm too much of a purist about such things.  Other than that, "Wordless Wednesday" is a concept that is actually quite attractive to me.  It appeals to my non-meticulous nature, I suppose.
9.  Blogging (like fiction writing, especially) usually tells us much more about the author than it does about the subject the author is writing about.  Frequently a lot more.  I'm not sure what this little observation means in my personal situation, other than it frightens me a little.  I just like to organize my thoughts and throw them out there for the world to mostly ignore.  I like to write, tho I'm not too good at it.  It's an outlet.
10.  I don't usually create lists.  I think this is the first list I've created since I've started this little blog.

The dreaded best practices.

Maybe if you've read this blog closely, and I'm sure at least one person has (me), you've picked up on my mildly anti-corporate attitudes.  So it's strange that I find myself immersed in this little eBay business we have, a business that is minute, even compared to most businesses down on Main Street in Valdese, North Carolina, of all places.  But the money it generates does come in handy, so I'm told.  I have to consult the company VP & Treasurer, Patti Anne, for the particulars.

So lately we've been thinking about "best practices" - a term I knew all too well in my previous life in a cubicle, a term I tossed into a heap with all the other business buzz words, including the term "buzz word", as just another business cliche among hundreds which taken together, ferment an indescribable bitterness in the very essence of my being.  These words and terms are frequently what pass for communication around the conference table.

I'm sorry, I went a way for a minute.  I'm back now.

Anyway we find we're bogged down in details of maintaining our eBay business.   The minutiae cause us to spend less time on the "core business" (bangs head on table), and as far as I'm concerned, the less time we spend on the (argggh) "core business", the less money we make.

The "core business" (from here on out simply known as CB) is obtaining inventory,  all the tasks involved with listing it, and shipping out sold items. That's it.  That is how we make money, everything else is a distraction.  We find we spend hours on other tasks which have to be done, but which are not directly involved in the CB.  So we put our heads together and came up with a plan.  

Some things can't be changed - inventory, once obtained,  has to be organized & stored, for example.  Once an item sells, it has to be retrieved.  That cannot be changed (unless we radically change our, ahem, business model), and may even be considered part of the CB.  Not sure.  At any rate, it takes some time & effort and it has to be done.

But some things can be changed.  And we've identified those areas we can change, where we can save some time.  But everything comes with a price.   Every advantage has a corresponding disadvantage.  It all boils down to sales.  It all boils down to money, and in a few months we'll know if it has made a difference.

Does anyone besides me ever wonder about money?  Where it came from, how it evolved, why does it have value, why does the value change?  Why did civilization develop the way it did so that a few are rich and many are poor?  I read a book called "The History of Money",  and that answered some of my questions.  I now know why "dollar" is a currency name, for example.

The concept of money is very abstract and required a leap of intelligence, understanding, and social organization somewhere along the way.  And it is ingrained.  We'll never get rid of it.  And its basic stuff, even for a little eBay business.  And from here on out, we'll probably be trying to let our thoughts wander aimlessly outside the imagined enclosure (which I always thought of as cardboard, and coming from a U-Haul store)  so perhaps we'll stumble on some even better way of doing things.