Remember Jack Nicholson’s famous line from A Few Good Men, “You can’t handle the truth”? These were the words I kept foremost in my mind as I did my big Marketing Week.  I decided that Okanagan Harvest Cake and Okanagan Fruit and Rum bars are NOT fruitcake.  So, I kept the dreaded F word right out of the conversation.

And what a successful and fantastic week it was!  I started here in Kelowna, and now my product is in St. Hubertus Winery as well as the gift shop in the lobby of the Grand Hotel, called Grand Snax.

I then proceeded south, and my first stop was the adorable Summerland Sweets store.  Imagine my joy as Karen, the owner, ordered a dozen of each!  Just like the proper Fuller Brush salesman, I had product in the car, so raced out and filled the order right there.

After that, I was just pumped with confidence, and went to the beautiful winery called Dirty Laundry.  You must go if you’ve never been.  They make three different kinds of Gewurztraminer, and as my Summer Serving Suggestion card recommends Gewurz with the cake, it was a natural fit.

I went far afield in either direction, first all the way to Therapy Winery in Naramata, then all the way to See Ya Later Ranch in Okanagan Falls.  In between, I met the wonderful women at Terwilligers gift shop in Penticton.  They were thrilled to see me, as the owner had heard of me from Monika, the artisan baker at Okanagan Grocery.

So after that heady greeting, I was bouyed to try the gift shop in Oliver called Handworks Gallery.  Ta da!  I’m in that store, too.  The toughtest town of all, though, remains my hometown of Osoyoos.  I left a sample with the N’Kmip restaurant, and am hoping they’ll okay the product for their new little upscale store.  It’d be perfect in there.

Once in Osoyoos at mom’s, I had the opportunity to coat my toes in bandages.  I had to look decent for the sales pitches, so was wearing my summer slides, and had forgotten the painful blisters they invoke.

The next day I drove off for more marketing, and upon leaving the Penticton VQA Wine store, was bemused to see that my bandages had come loose, and were flapping like giant false eyelashes over my toes as I walked.

Positive thoughts and vibes are a good way to start attracting good things to yourself, but you always have to do that last little thing – act.  By simply putting new labels on my boxes, loading the car, making a list of places to see, and then driving off and making myself walk into stores, I was able to make almost $1,000 worth of sales in a week!

I learned what any decent snake oil salesman knows, and that is you don’t upset the customer with abrupt language, such as the word ‘fruitcake’, which shocks the sensibilities.  No, I just kept the F word out of it entirely, and as you can see, things went very smoothly.