On Buying A Grocery Store

This is all new to us, the whole buying a business thing, the whole getting ready to run a grocery store thing. I mean, who knew that so many vendors were involved? Who knew that getting the POS to communicate with the scales was a very important step in the printing of labels? Who knew that buying produce was one of the most time consuming things an owner/general manager needs to do?

Certainly not me, but I do now!

We are about a week and a half out from taking over. Thankfully the current owners will plan to stay on for a while to help us learn the ropes. I think that is what is keeping these days from seeming overwhelming. As it is we are just pretty excited! We know that the learning curve will steep, but we are counting the days!

Apparently we need 5 gallon buckets of pepper...

It is funny that at the beginning of this year as I was looking ahead I decided to not make this a year of trying to do big things or make big changes, but just to shore up and strengthen the things already in place.

The bulk food room.

So far this year:

• I went to Panama for a new treatment.
• Douglas got engaged!
• We are buying a grocery store!!
• The children are changing schools.

That is a lot of changes for a year of no changes! :) :) :)

In 1 Month...

The last time I was in Taiwan I got a text from Keith. Now remember, it is a 13 hour time difference this time of year, so it was sent in the daytime here meaning it arrived in the middle of the night. I tend to wake up more often during the night while there (thank you, jet lag!), so one of my awake times I glanced at my phone to check the time and saw these words:

"Do you mind if I buy a business?"

At that point I was just like, "Whatever, sure, do it."

We did speak more about it over the phone when I was actually awake and he was really excited. I was a little blown away. Before I even got home, and I was only gone a week, he had gone to see the business and had made our interest in buying it known.

A few days after I got home, while I was still a bit fuzzy-headed from travel, we had a conversation with the sellers and got a tour of the business. And I got excited too.

There are a lot of steps that come in next. The waiting to hear if we would be the ones they would decide to sell to was a little hard. But when the answer came it was a YES!

So here we are, working through all of the legal steps to having a family business! I'll give more details soon, and {hopefully} some cute pictures. For now, we are looking at a real change of pace in about 1 month when we actually take over the business.

For those who don't know, what type of business do you think it might be?

And for those who do, please don't say quite yet! 

Pictures From Panama

We have been here in Panama for almost a day now. Our hotel is gorgeous and comfortable. We have an ocean view room with a balcony on the 26th floor. The view is mind-blowing. We can see ships waiting to go through the Panama Canal from our balcony.

We walked around a little today. We went inside a basilica, which was lovely.

Then we found ourselves wandering through some non-tourist-y parts of the city. I think my favorite part may have been when we saw people gathered in a shaded area playing dominoes.

I love the way photography is such an amazing way to bridge cultural differences. I could not speak with them, but I could understand that they wanted me to take their pictures. And I wanted to, and I loved showing them. The whole interchange was so fun!

The heat got to us and we headed back to the hotel for a cool, restful afternoon. Tomorrow I have my first appointment.