“Lots of people want to ride with you in the limo, but what you want is someone who will take the bus with you when the limo breaks down.”
Oprah Winfrey

My husband started a small business nearly 22 years ago. Well, to be more accurate, he took over a business where he had been an employee. 13 years ago I went to work in the business with him. Fast forward to now, and times have changed, we reached a point where it was no longer economically feasible to operate the business, but that’s not what this post is about.

We decided that the least painful thing was to quickly shut down, and we did so. And now we are emptying out our last store (we had more than one). It was the original location, and it has the most stuff in it. Twenty-two years of accumulated stuff. Files, desks, chairs, tools, calculators and adding machines, computers, printers, outdated merchandise, repaired items never picked up by customers (what is UP with that?), cleaning supplies, retail supplies and fixtures, sign holders, phone system, network, servers, break room supplies, etc. Piles and mountains of stuff. The landlord gave us extra time to clear out this last location. But with only one employee remaining part time, and two other locations that had to be cleared out first it is a lot of work for the two of us. Continue reading →