what's up?

autumn

We are in the midst of autumn here: Still not much rain until now and wonderful colors everywhere. I wish there was a bit more time to relax and enjoy the warmth of the season, but unfortunately there isn’t really. And no: I am not sitting in front of my perfume organ dreaming of the perfect patchouli. I am sitting in front of the computer and fiddle with dangerous goods shipments and other logistics.

But here’s the thing: The patchouli sits somewhere in my big fat excel sheet of everything fragrant, might need a twist here or there but is basically finished, and I am getting better everyday with dangerous goods and logistics. I realized that I know the Fedex tool better these days than many guys working for fedex and I can do the paperwork with closed eyes, it seems.

Besides all that: We have big discussions, here in the house of tauer, about the markets. Yes I know: “Yawn”. A boring topic, but with a thrilling aspect. You know: Everybody says how there is too much of everything. And how there is more and more entering the shelves. And in a market that does not grow, it means: The slices of the cake get smaller for everybody, or at some point some need to get out, or give up making money. Actually: You would not believe how many perfume brands do not make money at the end of the day.

Thus, when drinking my first coffee this morning, I figured: Actually, everybody tries to make the slice of the cake larger for himself by making more and pushing more into the market. More and faster. And as everybody does it: The slices won’t get bigger. And then, not having had my full dose of coffee (I am fishing for excuses here) I said to myself. Well, maybe, it is time to go the other way: Make less. And do it differently.

Like in the phone industry, where you actually do not have to pay anymore for the phone. You get it for free. What you buy is something else. A data contract in the case of phones. In the printer business it is similar. You pay virtually nothing for printers , but you pay by buying consumables in the end.

Still without enough coffee, I thought:I just need to figure out what data contracts means in the case of perfumes.

So you see: Sometimes my mornings are totally exciting.

And now: Off to the factory where my parcels wait for Fedex.