They do this thing every Fall season at our karate school where you can sell chocolate. They don't force anyone, really, I have never heard even a hint of somebody from the school saying something about "hey, you know, you do compete a lot and maybe you should sell some chocolate so we can improve the school's equipment" as I've heard in other sports. When I was young and playing hockey, selling stuff was mandatory. Everybody had to do it.
The idea is pretty simple. Pick up a bag of 22 bars, sell them at $3 a piece, bring back the money and get a $10 gift certificate you can use for equipment sold by the school, like bo, kama, kicks, punches, head gear, euqipment bag and the likes. I'm sure the school is making a tiny bit of profit on top of that $10 and I would guess they use it to indeed improve the training facilities, like that nice cushiony carpet they put in place for one half of the first floor.
Anyway, I had never done that in that past, meaning with the karate school. I guess I had psychological scars from my youth of going to ask my uncles and aunts if they would buy chocolate, and/or walking in the neighborhood, door to door, asking neighboors I didn't always knew, if they wanted to support me.
Seeing how every once in a while, a coworker would come around with something to sell for one of his kids, I thought "hey what the heck, I could be that guy, bring the chocolate to work and hopefully see it sell by itself". I picked up a bag on Monday, right after my class. I wanted to see how many my mom would buy yesterday when she came visiting us, so I waited until today to bring it to work. I had 11 bars left in my bag after my mom bought 9 of them (yeah, Andrew and Matthew are their only two grandchildren and they tend to be a bit enthusiastic about anything they do ;) ). Well, what do you know, got in to work at 7:45, day starts at 8 and by 8:05, all 11 bars were sold with me offering them to maybe 7 persons. One of them is a lady from sales around here and she almost giggled uncontrollably at the sight of chocolate. She bought two rightaway, saying something along the lines of "I'll go tell the others at the other end of the corridor" and bang, another lady from finance was at my desk within 30 seconds, buying 3, one for her two for her boss. I tell ya, it was pure frenzy. People came to me until about 10 am asking me if it was right that I had chocolate for sale. Seeing how so many people seemed to want some, I'll pick up at least one, if not two bags this weekend and I've told everyone I'd have some more on Monday :) That lady from sales has already presold two bars...
Anyway, two more bags would make it $30 toward the purchase of Andrew's custom designed bo. They are a bit costly, at $75 per, but they are hand decorated and amazingly light. I had mine done last Spring. This is what it looks like (click the thumbnail to see bigger):
It's not exactly the same, but I used that picture to tell them what I wanted. I will have to sit down with Andrew and see what colors he would like...
FM
PS to blackbeltmama: I'll post something about our kata lingo soon. I'm only resarching some of it a bit more.
The idea is pretty simple. Pick up a bag of 22 bars, sell them at $3 a piece, bring back the money and get a $10 gift certificate you can use for equipment sold by the school, like bo, kama, kicks, punches, head gear, euqipment bag and the likes. I'm sure the school is making a tiny bit of profit on top of that $10 and I would guess they use it to indeed improve the training facilities, like that nice cushiony carpet they put in place for one half of the first floor.
Anyway, I had never done that in that past, meaning with the karate school. I guess I had psychological scars from my youth of going to ask my uncles and aunts if they would buy chocolate, and/or walking in the neighborhood, door to door, asking neighboors I didn't always knew, if they wanted to support me.
Seeing how every once in a while, a coworker would come around with something to sell for one of his kids, I thought "hey what the heck, I could be that guy, bring the chocolate to work and hopefully see it sell by itself". I picked up a bag on Monday, right after my class. I wanted to see how many my mom would buy yesterday when she came visiting us, so I waited until today to bring it to work. I had 11 bars left in my bag after my mom bought 9 of them (yeah, Andrew and Matthew are their only two grandchildren and they tend to be a bit enthusiastic about anything they do ;) ). Well, what do you know, got in to work at 7:45, day starts at 8 and by 8:05, all 11 bars were sold with me offering them to maybe 7 persons. One of them is a lady from sales around here and she almost giggled uncontrollably at the sight of chocolate. She bought two rightaway, saying something along the lines of "I'll go tell the others at the other end of the corridor" and bang, another lady from finance was at my desk within 30 seconds, buying 3, one for her two for her boss. I tell ya, it was pure frenzy. People came to me until about 10 am asking me if it was right that I had chocolate for sale. Seeing how so many people seemed to want some, I'll pick up at least one, if not two bags this weekend and I've told everyone I'd have some more on Monday :) That lady from sales has already presold two bars...
Anyway, two more bags would make it $30 toward the purchase of Andrew's custom designed bo. They are a bit costly, at $75 per, but they are hand decorated and amazingly light. I had mine done last Spring. This is what it looks like (click the thumbnail to see bigger):
It's not exactly the same, but I used that picture to tell them what I wanted. I will have to sit down with Andrew and see what colors he would like...
FM
PS to blackbeltmama: I'll post something about our kata lingo soon. I'm only resarching some of it a bit more.
4 comments:
Selling chocolat at work is a good idea but not for me. 2 coworkers here have found this idea so good that they are now selling chocolats permanantly at the reception (365 days/years). They put boxes of chocolats bar, and its a pay and serv yourself style.
So "my dog is dead ! :)"
that's kind of sad but by "permanently", do you mean they sell it kind of commercially, as a business? If so, I'm sure there would be many takers for your chocolate bars if told people it's for your little kiddo. People have a lot of compassion for other's people's kid. It was clear I would not say this was for me, although many people know I practice karate with my son. Having a picture of him in his gi with his medals from the Quebec Open sure did make it an easy sell though ;)
Steve.
chocolate!
hummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
I am of the mind that you can't go wrong with chocolate as long as it's GOOD chocolate. My husband supported a volleyball team once by buying two bars of chocolate from them. The sugary wax that we ate that day was far from yummy.. It's amazing what they can sell by calling it a "chocolaty coating"... Yuck!
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