One of the nice things about Christmas vacation is having our daughter home from college. Sophia got home yesterday and when the topic of working came up I was a little nervous as she ducked out of getting any hours during Thanksgiving. But as she now has $34.87 in her checking account she quickly chimed in that she would report...Read More
I mentioned before that I'm doing a program called The 12 Week Year launching the first week of January. Some of the strategies might be helpful to anyone reading so here goes. The system really comes down to tracking the tactics that you believe will help you meet your goals on a weekly basis. It's more about choosing the...Read More
Sometimes you get a call and you have to drop what you are doing and jump in the van in this business. That happened to me late last week. I was planning on attending the Old Hickory TOR on Friday. But I got a deal that was too good to be true about 5 hours away. So Sunday I pushed...Read More
It's been a long time since I attended a TOR with just a small cloth bag of stuff and no ambitions other than talking to people. I did have one prearranged deal and some Best Hobby drop offs but mostly I came to see people and pass out some of my own TOR fliers. It's pretty remarkable that North Carolina...Read More
For some time I have have made available as a free PDF download all of my prices realized guides and some other resources on my ScoutPatchHQ shopify store. Chris Jensen does something similar on his website. Yesterday on a Facebook post a fellow collector was suggesting I mail out CSP and OA lodge checklists. So I wanted to poll the subscribers...Read More
Tomorrow I am taking my patch warehouse employees out to lunch and giving them a nice Xmas bonus to celebrate all we have accomplished in 2024. In terms of sales the business all together had our best year ever. That's saying something in this economic environment. Some of you will remember that in 2023 I had 4 different eBay...Read More
First off let me thank Kevin and Todd and all the folks that helped put on the NCAC TOR at Camp Snyder this weekend. I got to see so many collecting friends and catch up with them. A bunch of us went out to breakfast Saturday morning and I was reminded that is what's so important about TORs - the...Read More
I am happy to announce that table reservations are now live for the 7th Annual Charlotte TOR. We are back to the normal date for us which is 2 weekends prior to Easter - so this year April 4-5. The event is held at my church in our 7,000+ sq ft fellowship hall. This year I am bringing back the silent...Read More
it seems like lately I have not been able to get to as many TORs as I would like. A lot of that has to do with how busy things are at home. But I've faithfully mailed out TOR calendars with all of my eBay orders to try and help get the word out. But finally this weekend I am...Read More
It's Black Friday but my crew is in the warehouse today getting orders shipped out and photographing merit badges. My son is handling the camera duties and I am working on NOAC issues. We have some leftovers in the fridge ready for lunch time. I am traveling a week from today to attend the NCAC Trade-O-Ree at Camp Snyder....Read More
As a married person tell me if you have ever tried to pull this off. My wife is out of town for a few days studying for a financial exam she is taking for her job. I told her I was finally going to tackle a complete makeover of our garage. So for the last two days I have been...Read More
I saw on Facebook yesterday that Larry Lane is working to update a list of Scouting museums across the country. This list also includes many council displays that might hang in the office or out at camp. But importantly he is seeking to identify who is considered the "curator" of these collections. It got me thinking that 2025 would...Read More
When these three boxes arrived from New Mexico I didn't really know what I was going to find. I knew some of the background from speaking to the family but had no idea I would find an absolute display piece jewel in this collection. I have been collecting Air Scout and other Senior Scouting items for going on a...Read More
I spent all day today reloading merit badges into the store. In the most recent sort we did I came up with hundreds of mint condition merit badges. I have previously listed almost all of them so with the software we use it was easy to restock them. eBay also makes it very easy to increase the quantity available on live...Read More
Today I picked up a $1500 order for the cards that go in Best Hobby Pages envelopes. It's part of the churn that every so often I have to write a big check to keep the old saying "Got Plastic We Do" alive. Luckily since the beginning I have walled off the BHP within my business so the finances remain separate and...Read More