Update: 10/14/05: Our First Customer-Kind Of

Here is my latest entry to bring things up to date.

This past Wednesday (10/12/05), I baby sat for my youngest sister (Chrissy) and her husband (Joe). Appearently, Joe had tire problems on his souped up 2004 Mustang, and had to take it to get fixed or replaced. So when Joe came back to pick up the kids, he treated me out for some Mexican at this really nice restaurant her in Elgin (IL) called Azteca de Oro. He didn't have to do that, but it was nice all the same. He told me that he was looking to sell an upgrade body kit for his car. Appearently, the paint job didn't meet his expectations, and he had to get a new one. So now he has this extra kit, and he wants to sell it. As we had been working together on some other sites (giving my impressions), he said that he would like to sell it through my site, but mostly on Ebay. He said that all he wanted was a couple hundred dollars for it (retails new for almost $900), and I could keep the rest. I told him that what I would do is put it on my site for free, and list it on Ebay for whatever they charge. I would sell it for him on consignment, and charge him a flat % if and when it was sold.

And so the problem: I hadn't even created all of the necessary forms and applications that I need. This was my inputis. I have been working diligently the last four nites for this business, getting only about 16 hours of sleep, TOTAL!! Well, there will be plenty of time to sleep when I cross over, but for now, I need to get things pushed into high gear. I created the Advertising & Listing Application. I thought this would be fairly strait forward, and for the most part, it was. The problem I had was in creating the form entries. I had limited experience in the past with creating forms in MS Word...and that has been a long time. Additionally, I really never learned much other than how to place fields in their location. As I tend to be a perfectionist, I wanted the whole thing to be perfect before I sent it out: however, I realized that being that he is a realitive of mine, he probably wouldn't be to critical of my "1st draft". So I finished typing it out this afternoon, and sent it to him. Later this afternoon, I went back to continue refining the form, when I noticed that I had locked it, and he won't even be able to edit online (of course he could always print it out, fill it in and then fax it to me); but I want to make it as easy as posible for my customers (even family members).

It is now almost 1900, and I will finish making this entry, and then I have to create the Consignment Agreement. I have been doing my Due Dilligence with respect to Joe's car kit: researching the MSRP, as well as what other venders are selling it for. Additoinally, I will monitor ebay and other sites to see what this type of item is selling for, so I know how we should price it. I may actually do that first, prior to creating the Consignment Agreement.

Well, not much more to say at this time. Will write again when I have something to add.

This Is It...FINALLY

Hear Ye, Here Ye, The Black Cat Enterprises-Grandma's Attic blog is officially ready for business...

I am finally getting down to writing this entry. Actually, I had already wrote this several days ago, but my computer just "convieniently" decided to lock up just as I was posting my hard efforts. I guess I will go and systematically save as a draft until I am ready to post. This post is mainly about the inception, developing and continuation of my web site, Grandma's Attic, located at www.BuyGrandmasAttic.com.

So here goes...

On Thursday, August 18th, 2005 I had an idea; an epiphany if you will. The idea was to create a site where I could market items that I had for sale; as well as for my family and friends. I came up the the concept of Grandma's Attic: partially to honor my grandmothers, as well as my mother (a grandmother 17, soon to be 18), and my wife, a grandmother of 3. I thought that besides my own items that I wanted to get rid of, I could also seek out product that I could sell for other vendors, and have them "dropped shipped" to my "customers". Lastly, I thought I could seek out unique items that I would obtain at really low price, and to resell at a modest profit.

From that grew my determination in developing Grandma's Attic into not only a place for my family, friends and myself to sell our wares; but to become a community of like minded individuals who wish to Browse, Buy, and Sell items at Bargain prices. I had now started down the road to becoming a new web marketers. I did however, have another motivation. I had been suffering a debilitating condition that made it very difficult for me to work in a "traditional" work environment. I had just lost another position because of this condition, and so I decided to make the very most of this. I know, that with the grace of God above, this will become a success. My other motivator was and continues to be my wife, Barb. She is a professional truck driver for Waste Management, Inc. near our home. However, Barb's health is worstening and I want to not only do my part for our family, but to give Barb options for her future (she wants to go back to school, for instance).

So I did my due diligence (and continue in doing so), and started to develop the site. I already had a business PayPal & Ebay accounts, which I had set up a year prior: but I wanted more options for Grandma's Attic customers. So we now have a merchant account, and accept Visa, MasterCard, Discover & American Express, as well as checks and money orders for offline orders. I am still having some problems with the intragration with my shopping cart, but I will continue to work on that. People can still place orders with their cards: it is just that the information has to be manually transmitted through the system at this time.

I had recently added a way for people to contact me via the Yahoo! Instant Messenger (YIM) which is available on select pages of the site. On 10/10/05, I added this new feature as an added benefit for our visitors: THIS BLOG. Here is where I will post the most relevant changes to my site, as well as allowing our community to read, reply and post items as well. I will be looking at getting a more sophisticated system for visitors to contact us in an online support format: but that will need to wait until we can afford it and there is a need/demand for it. Until then, we have multiple avenues for visitors to contact us.

As I have been writing this blog for a couple of hours (while trying to babysat my sister's kids), I will not go into our plans for this site at this time. Also, I have been averaging 2.5 hours of sleep recently; so as soon as my brother-in-law gets here, I will be taking a short nap, before I start with my afternoon activities.

I hope and pray that you enjoy our site, this blog, and the community that I am so diligently trying to establish. May God's grace be with your every step. Please check back here often, as who knows what you will find here.

-John

This is my picture from my very first job as an Over-The-Road (OTR) truck driver. At the time (circa 1999), I was living in South Salt Lake, Ut with my wife Barb, and our teen son, Mack. We only ended up living in UT for about a year. Once I went on the road, Barb became "home sick" for her Chicago based family: so she decided that she wanted to move back there. I followed shortly thereafter when it was discovered that Barb had about 7 cysts in her uterus; and needed me to be there to help and support her while she underwent surgery. Actually, she had the proceedure while I was still on the road, but I came home for good soon after.
Posted By John "The Black Cat" Shachter

Okay...one even more silly than the other. I created this pic some years ago, using the previous image as the starting point. I adopted the name el Gato Negro (The Black Cat) because a woman that I was madly, truely deeply in love with (at the time); loved black cats. Well, needless to say, it didn't help my chances with her: but the name stuck. The image over me sitting on the sofa was taken in Jamacia (circa 1989) from the balcony of the hotel I was staying at when I had fist gotten married (wife #1). Hope you enjoy this one too.
Posted By John "The Black Cat" Shachter

This is an old photo of me back in about 1997, when I used to run a foster home for People with disabilities. I guess I never miss the chance to be silly, as is evident here.
Posted By John "The Black Cat" Shachter

And Introducing...Grandma's Attic

This is our new site, Grandma's Attic

Here is where you can Browse, Buy And Sell Items at Bargain Prices.

• Browse: You will have the chance to browse hundreds of items that are listed in our many online "catalogs".
• Buy: Once you have found something that you like, you can add it to your shopping cart. After you have added all the items you want to your cart, you will then have the ability to complete the purchase. We currently Accept the following methods of payment at Grandma's Attic: Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover, PayPal (preferred), as well as checks and money orders.
• Sell: In addition to making purchases from our site may now be an active participant in this virtual market place. For a Flat Fee, you can list your product or service with a full discription and up to 3 pictures, for up to 30 days at a time. Please refer to the site for more information.

We have many programs and services that we offer our different levels of clientel. Our most popular is our Rebate Program. Depending on several factors, we will rebate to you anywhere from 1-25% of your previous month's total retail purchases (not including tax or shipping) of items purchased from BCE-GA (not including other listing visitors, subscribers or members. Please see our site for more details at http://www.BuyGrandmasAttic.com
Posted By John "The Black Cat" Shachter