When I go a day or two without blogging, it usually means that work has kept me busy. People always wonder what can keep me so busy when my office is in my home. Here's a snapshot of the last 48 hours.
Monday: 6:45 am. I received a phone call from a broker in Cairo who wanted to know the process for setting up an account with a US sauce supplier. We worked through the key contacts and what needed to be done. Before and after that call, I was trying to get in touch with someone who could send me the Arabic labels for the same sauce because now we had 1500 cases at the warehouse, all of them needing the label. After assuring everyone that I would stay in touch throughout the day, I packed an overnight bag and started the drive to Carpinteria. I made it halfway there when the next call came in. This call was to let me know that the ice cream company that I had approved for Kuwait, had just gone out of business rather unexpectedly. Turns out that the city made a huge offer for the land and the owner sold. Luckily, there is a back up ice cream available and I started the process for approval of the new company.
I get to the office and find out that the test kitchen that was reserved for my demo of Cheesesteak and Buffalo Chicken had been rebooked for a photo shoot. There was a quick and mad scramble to get everything ready for me and get me out of there as the cameras were moving in.
I check e-mail and the 30 minutes that I was away, another crisis happened. The Cairo group wanted the sauce delivered to their port in Alexandria, Egypt. Well no can do on our end, so I had to find a freight forwarder who could deliver the sauce and learn the process for setting up the account. I put the new proposal out there to see what would happen.
Then I decided to relax and follow up on the graphics design for Russia and make sure the graphics were going to get posted on the ftp site. Another call, another visit, and yet another hopeful response.
I finished the work day with a call to a different sauce supplier to check on international shipping options. Then it was off to the hotel where I spent the next couple of hours doing homework and obsessively watching the news for Lebanon coverage.
Today, Tuesday, I woke up at 6:00 am since I knew the day was going to be crazy. Sure enough, we got the Arabic labels but they were the wrong ones. Cairo called to let me know that they wanted to now use a forwarded in Egypt for the sauce and what was the next step? Then I went on to chocolate and vanilla syrup labels to find out what modifications we would be allowed to do to make Kuwait customs happy. I filled in the gaps with minor correspondance about food samples and the next thing I knew it was 8:30 am and time to hit the 101 south for the drive home. I spent most of the time talking to the syrup supplier, and some minor texting while in traffic about the sauce.
By the time I got back to Carlsbad, I was already wiped out. The afternoon was spent on the previously discussed items, added in a bit of a mix of Canada, Russia, and Mexico issues and then I got another random call. This was from a forwarder in NYC who was given my name by sauce group #2 because I needed options. As the way things go from person to person, this guy thought I wanted to ship to Lebanon, today. He had to let me know that the ports were closed and such a thing wasn't possible. Yup, some major miscommunication going on here. As the conversation progressed, I think he realized he was uniformed and we ended on a decent note. You never know what contact, no matter how clumsly, will fill a need for you later on.
So now it's 9:30 pm. I'm done with work and school for the day. But it will all repeat for each of these same items in about 9 hours from now. I sometimes feel like the Brain, when everynight Pinky asks "what are we going to do tomorrow night, Brain?" And Brain replies, "the same thing we do everynight Pinky, try to take over the world!"
Monday: 6:45 am. I received a phone call from a broker in Cairo who wanted to know the process for setting up an account with a US sauce supplier. We worked through the key contacts and what needed to be done. Before and after that call, I was trying to get in touch with someone who could send me the Arabic labels for the same sauce because now we had 1500 cases at the warehouse, all of them needing the label. After assuring everyone that I would stay in touch throughout the day, I packed an overnight bag and started the drive to Carpinteria. I made it halfway there when the next call came in. This call was to let me know that the ice cream company that I had approved for Kuwait, had just gone out of business rather unexpectedly. Turns out that the city made a huge offer for the land and the owner sold. Luckily, there is a back up ice cream available and I started the process for approval of the new company.
I get to the office and find out that the test kitchen that was reserved for my demo of Cheesesteak and Buffalo Chicken had been rebooked for a photo shoot. There was a quick and mad scramble to get everything ready for me and get me out of there as the cameras were moving in.
I check e-mail and the 30 minutes that I was away, another crisis happened. The Cairo group wanted the sauce delivered to their port in Alexandria, Egypt. Well no can do on our end, so I had to find a freight forwarder who could deliver the sauce and learn the process for setting up the account. I put the new proposal out there to see what would happen.
Then I decided to relax and follow up on the graphics design for Russia and make sure the graphics were going to get posted on the ftp site. Another call, another visit, and yet another hopeful response.
I finished the work day with a call to a different sauce supplier to check on international shipping options. Then it was off to the hotel where I spent the next couple of hours doing homework and obsessively watching the news for Lebanon coverage.
Today, Tuesday, I woke up at 6:00 am since I knew the day was going to be crazy. Sure enough, we got the Arabic labels but they were the wrong ones. Cairo called to let me know that they wanted to now use a forwarded in Egypt for the sauce and what was the next step? Then I went on to chocolate and vanilla syrup labels to find out what modifications we would be allowed to do to make Kuwait customs happy. I filled in the gaps with minor correspondance about food samples and the next thing I knew it was 8:30 am and time to hit the 101 south for the drive home. I spent most of the time talking to the syrup supplier, and some minor texting while in traffic about the sauce.
By the time I got back to Carlsbad, I was already wiped out. The afternoon was spent on the previously discussed items, added in a bit of a mix of Canada, Russia, and Mexico issues and then I got another random call. This was from a forwarder in NYC who was given my name by sauce group #2 because I needed options. As the way things go from person to person, this guy thought I wanted to ship to Lebanon, today. He had to let me know that the ports were closed and such a thing wasn't possible. Yup, some major miscommunication going on here. As the conversation progressed, I think he realized he was uniformed and we ended on a decent note. You never know what contact, no matter how clumsly, will fill a need for you later on.
So now it's 9:30 pm. I'm done with work and school for the day. But it will all repeat for each of these same items in about 9 hours from now. I sometimes feel like the Brain, when everynight Pinky asks "what are we going to do tomorrow night, Brain?" And Brain replies, "the same thing we do everynight Pinky, try to take over the world!"
Comments
Post a Comment