Hey, it’s Bob, and in this episode of Real Retail TV we’re gonna talk about breakthroughs and how do you, how do you make them happen. So I just got done doing a live panel called The Big Shift, and I had 3 guests on, 3 very successful retailers who I know well, and they were talking about the breakthroughs they had. In their businesses and it was a lovely conversation, really, really enjoyed it, but somebody posted in chat, they said, how do you get the breakthroughs? These people were talking about the breakthroughs they had, but they wanted to know, wow, we’ve got, we’ve got a lot of lot of vehicles here in Grand Haven today. But uh it got me reflecting or and the answer that I gave was you don’t let them happen, you don’t hope they happen, you make them happen, you set yourself up for breakthroughs. And what do I mean by that? I mean that you have to work for them, you have to be open for them, you have to read books. You have to um take courses. If you have the retail mastery system, you have to go through it on a regular basis. What we were talking about in the context of this, um, this program was all three of them had been through a program that we do call the Business Breakthrough Accelerator Program, and I’ll talk about that in just a A little bit, but for Susan and I, we were in a mastermind for many years. I’m in another mastermind now, but the point is, is that you have to proactively open your mind to bigger things. You have to proactively open your mind to possibilities. One of the things that um Uh, Jill Tack talked about. Jill and her partner Louis owned the pet bistro, and she said that her big breakthrough came when she wrote a vision statement for her business because, or actually what she said was, Louis and I both wrote vision statements and we were very pleased to see that our visions were very, very aligned. But there’s this idea that You don’t know where you, until you know where you wanna go, it’s, you’re going to have a hard time getting there. So the act of putting pen to paper and thoughtfully engaging your brain in what you really want out of your business, that in and of itself was a breakthrough. I talked about the fact that I went to a Uh, keynote speech by J. Conrad Levinson at, uh, the Kite Trade Association many, many, many, many, many years ago, and it was in February, and Michigan in February is in cold. It is cold and Miami Beach in February is warm, and I almost didn’t go to the keynote because I wanted to stay by the pool and be out in the warmth, but I went and I had this breakthrough. J. Conrad Levinson talked about the fact that um he talked about marketing in a way that I had never heard or thought of marketing before. But you see, if I hadn’t been in the room, If Jill, Marie, and Angela hadn’t been at the Breakthrough accelerator program, if you hadn’t invested in the course, if you hadn’t bought the book, those breakthroughs probably wouldn’t have happened. Yes, a blind pig finds an acorn now and again. Yes, you may have a breakthrough just by being there and doing work every day, but something I can tell you for a fact is that the best way to get the breakthroughs that are going to change your business, the trajectory of your business for a long, long time is to show up, be in the room, do the work, which leads me to the Breakthrough accelerator program. It’s happening here in Grand Haven, Michigan, September 22 and 24. What is it? It is a carefully designed program to help you. So guys from the Coast Guard, we’re in Coast Guard City, USA Grand Haven, Michigan, and actually, this week is Coast Guard Festival. But anyway, back to the BBA, the BBA Business Breakthrough Accelerator Program. There’s 3 phases, carefully designed. Phase one, you do before you get to Grand Haven. You do some homework. You think about you and your business. And you start to come up with ideas. Then you come to Grand Haven for 3 days, and in those 3 days, Susan and I and the other people in the room are gonna help you really, really hone in on what is your best opportunity, what’s your biggest problem you may need to solve, or the biggest bottleneck you may need to eliminate. Go ahead. Oh, OK. That’s the problem. You want to go around this way? OK, all right. I should have just stayed at my office. That’s fine. But you think about that and people will think about that with you. And at the end of those 3 days, you have an action plan. And then for the next 90 days, at 30 days, we have a check-in. How are you doing against your action plan? 60 days, there’s a check-in. How are you doing at your action plan? At 90 days, there’s a final check-in and there’s a celebration because guess what? If you do the work, you will have accomplished that breakthrough. And we were talking about what a powerful experience the business breakthrough accelerator was for those people. They came in 2015. They came 11 years ago and all 3 of them could remember the names of almost everybody who was in the room with them. It’s that powerful an experience. So if you’re ready to break through, if you’re, if you feel in your heart that there is a bigger future in front of you, but you just don’t know how to unlock it. Make the investment, take the time. Be here in Grand Haven for the business breakthrough accelerated. You’ll be really, really glad you did. All right, I’m Bob Negen and we’ll see you again next week. Bye-bye.