Well, it’s nice to be through with 2002. Not that there was anything horribly wrong with it, although I spent an unwelcome amount of the final days near the toilet compliments of the flu. As you shuffle that to the “Too Much Information” file, I’ll move on. We did fall short of some of our goals for last year, which can get one down and cause one to ask oneself, “Were we too unrealistic?”, “Am I a horrible leader?” or “Should we have sprung for that Super Bowl commercial?” Being ever the optimist (I’m a Cubs fan), I have decided to learn from last year and look ahead enthusiastically to the one in front of me. There are a lot of things to be positive about, including some unprecedented capital with which we can finally do some things that need to be done. We did two trade shows last year, both in Chicago. We learned a lot from the experiences and got some great sales. This year we’re planning on expanding our territory and hitting eight shows, including stops in Indianapolis, Dallas, Columbus and Minneapolis. We are finally getting a printed version of our catalog, which is something I’ve been pining for since we sold our first greeting card. It should roll off the presses in a week or so. And, I must say, it is pretty sweet. Sixteen pages of full-color goodness. Other things worth mentioning include more Club K&J promotions in the works and a pitch to appear in more newsprint. And finally, we’ve been working on a support program for Kim & Jason retailers, including a product display that store owners can use to show off our stuff. I think we’ve got a very nice solution that compliments our products nicely. Before long, we’ll be getting humongous custom floor units specially designed for Hallmark and Marshall Field’s…but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. That’s planned for 2004.
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