I have often joked that, “if you have my home address, it’s because I want you to send me a gift!”
But no one ever got the joke!
History
In the 17-years between their founding in 1906 and their acquisition of Babe Ruth in 1923 through a trade with the Red Sox, the Yankees were consistent.
In a way which fans of the New York Mets would understand!
For seven of those years the team played as the New York Highlanders, only adopting the name Yankees in 1913.
Needing a bigger stadium to monetize THE Babe going viral, the Yankees purchased a 10-acre patch of dirt from the estate of William Waldorf Aster. The land, along the eastern bank of New York’s East River, which the Yankees would make hallow with their 27 World Series Championships.
Fans of the Yankees know the spot.
Much of the baseball history I just dropped on you comes from a book I recently acquired about the New York Yankees.
The book tells the story of the New York Yankees franchise from their founding in 1903 to the present day. At over 500-pages, it leaves no story untold.
Except for the one about how I came to possess the book in the first place, which remains a mystery. My understanding of where the book came from on-par with my daughter Buck Wheat's understanding of where her new boots or her clothing comes from:
"Amazon brought it!"
Who Are You?
Thinking that they might feel guilting for not gifting on my last birthday, I texted my sister Marci and nephew Andrew asking them if they had recently sent me any gifts?
They confirmed that they have not sent me enough gifts recently!
Stamford Office Space
Recently I’ve changed the "branding" of the work-space my fiancee Gaetana allows me in her house from the corporate headquarters of THE Revolution to, "THE Studio!”
A name more fitting the space now that a Gorgie-suggested big screen and Philip’s Hue lighting system have been installed.
Who wants to work in a corporate headquarters anyway? More on that in a moment.
These days my time in THE Studio is well-sunk into the details of version two of THE Revolution, my web and e-commerce package for independent paint dealers.
With Aucutt’s Paint Store in Clovis, New Mexico set to be the first version two dealer to “go live” in the coming weeks, my thrice-weekly conversations with the development team have transitioned from visions of features and upgrades, to details and databases.
The first non-Benjamin Moore dealer to grab a musket and join my Revolution, Aucutt’s presented additional challenges from the first seven sites I have put up, all of which were Benjamin Moore dealers.
PPG does not currently provide the digital support dealers need to build e-commerce websites so my team has had to “build” Aucutt’s virtual “Voice of Color” color display. As well as the rest of the the PPG product database. No small task once PPG left us with no solutions beyond, “You can cut and paste it all from our site.”
Gee, thanks I guess? PPG dealers looking to grow their businesses online should demand better of the $16,000,000,000 coatings giant.
If PPG expects their dealers to join the digital world, which they must do to grow or even just hold onto market share in the post-covid retail landscape, the manufacturer must provide their dealers with the means to do the job. Dealers will need digital color displays, branded tools to (virtually) select a color and paint a room as well as access to a databases of products with their appropriate descriptions, pictures and videos.
To start!
Because PPG dealers will also need a means to keep all that data up-to-date.
I’ve written previously that Benjamin Moore has done an excellent job in this regard. Their simple “API-based” model makes for a smooth interface between the Benjamin Moore data repositories and dealer’s web sites which are looking to access the extensive color and product data Benjamin Moore maintains for use by dealers in the digital age.
If you read this and are familiar with the dealer-channel team at PPG and want to help their 400 (my guess) dealers nationwide, send them a link to this blog please? I'll be happy to share with them my experience building web sites for dealers, in the hope that they take some action for their dealers.
The Good Book
My questioning of Marci and Andrew got me no closer to solving the mystery of the gifted Yankee knowledge. But here is what I know having made some wild assumptions which are best left unchallenged!
Gifts come from grateful people as a means to show favor. It's hard to argue with Webster's!
And that means anonymous gifts come from grateful people who can’t let you to know that they’re grateful, perhaps because of some affiliation or circumstance.
Lighting Bolt
Last year I did a consulting job for a major paint manufacturer, working for months to develop content for paint geeks like us.
When the content-building work was completed, we prepared to launch a new communications channel for independent paint dealers. We located the access point to the content on the Benjamin Moore dealer portal.
So that no one would find it!
In a phone call 48-hours before launch I learned a business lesson which 30-years as a paint dealer never taught me.
It’s better not to care so much!
Water under the bridge! Weeks later, my tenure as the Strategic Counselor at Benjamin Moore was Covided, in the Montvale Massacre.
The pandemic costing Benjamin Moore CEO Dan Calkins his chance to say thank you.
Which he felt the need to do anonymously, due to how awkwardly long he waited to speak up!
Unless, it was from Aaron Boone?
