Almanac Monthly Updates/Blog!
My small business is growing! hooray! All thanks to you guys drinking my coffee in multiple cafes and homes around Brisbane and Australia (and even sometimes globally)! As this growth is happening, I'm expanding, I'm learning, new business workflows are adopted, and unfortunately sometimes certain things get left behind. Certain standards are forgotten or fall to a lower priority.
The goal of these monthly posts is to not only let you know what I'm working on improving, to give you insight in to why i make certain decisions, but also to open discussion, to get feedback from you beautiful people on what you've been enjoying, what you'd like to see more of from me, or even more importantly, what you'd like to see less of and what you're not enjoying! Im always looking for feedback, good or bad!
Almanac always has been, and ALWAYS will be focused on building community. And I feel this style of post and discussion could be really effective at achieving that. So each month, ill write down a few dot points on areas that need improvement / focus and then a more lengthy post on my website (character limits on instagram) to explain those points in detail and the thought process behind them. Hopefully this will open up discussion too if you feel inclined. Lets get this started hey, heres my points of focus for the rest of October.
- I'm officially Full time Almanac!
- New coffees will appear more frequently
- Social media presence will improve (slowly)
- Blog Posts on the website -
Wholesale communication
Full Time Almanac!:
Some of you may not know me, but my name's Robbie (hello!), and I'm actually the only person at Almanac. I'm a sole trader and only person that works here. While I'm super lucky to have the support of some very close friends to help me with advice and direction, Almanac is my baby!
From the conception of Almanac in 2017, up until a few weeks ago I've maintained other employment, roasting for different companies and having Almanac as a side project, but this has all changed very recently due to the steady growth and support you've all supplied me with. Im now officially, FULL TIME ALMANAC! Which is amazing, but also very scary. This is actually the inspiration behind this post. I now have the time to put everything I have in to my first born child Almanac and I want to let you all know how im doing it, and hopefully you guys can steer me in the direction of why you drink Almanac. Id love to bring you all with me on the journey, because I wouldnt be able to do it without all of you!
New Coffees Will Appear More Frequently:
In order to make labels for packaging affordable, minimum order quantities with a printer have to be met otherwise they can be expensive.
In the past, as I secure a few microlots, I wasn't able to release them once they arrive due to needing 6-7 different micro lots to have enough labels to meet the quantities required. This means it gets to the stage where it is now, as we await new labels, where you only have 1-2 options and my webstore only has Colombian Golden Mix up there which isnt exciting for you to see. Going forward, I've teamed up with a small printing business in Brisbane who's agreed to make no minimum order quantities and keep prices low at the same time. This means as I secure coffees I can release them quicker than usual! This will lead to more variety on cafes' shelves, more variety on the webstore and also more social media presence as I can talk about each coffee as they come out instead of being overwhelmed! Overall this is actually a really exciting change! (yay adulthood; finding printing exciting)
Social media presence will improve (slowly):
It's no secret that my social media presence is lacking to say the least. The feedback I'm getting currently is that you'd like to see more of me (which is lovely - thank you), or of what I'm working on. It's been really hard to get myself in front of the camera, as it's only me at Almanac I don't really have anyone to take photos of me doing day to day things. I'm quite a perfectionist with my photos, and if I'm not completely happy with the photo, the colours, what's in the background than I usually won't post it. However, I have nearly finished setting up two different photoshoot locations in my work space that will allow me to be happier with the quality of image, and to be able to set up cameras and shoots more easily and efficiently. Once these locations are set up, you'll see social media posts more often!
Blog Posts on the Website:
Well, here we are! Fairly straight forward here. I've set up this blog post section for these monthly updates, and any other exciting info, keep you eyes pealed, and ill likely post about it on Insta whenever I post here also.
Wholesale Communication:
As growth is happening, I feel as though I tend to get really excited about these new wholesale accounts coming on board (as I should). I post about them on my stories and posts often. But unfortunately I have been forgetting / showing less love to those that have been with me for a while. It's really easy to get carried away in growth and have incredible recency bias. I don't like that I havent posted about the likes of Dovetail, Mongrel, Anthology, Gramps and other places that have been supporting me for a long time!
If you made it, thanks so much for reading this far! I appreciate you a lot! Chat soon.