Summer Lemonade Stand

by

One of the many wonderful benefits of being in a neighborhood with a lot of kids is the fun of driving down the street and seeing a summer lemonade stand popped up on the corner. It has been so long since I’ve lived in a real neighborhood during the summer that seeing a lemonade stand yesterday just made my day! Of course I pulled over and bought a cup of lemonade and some cookies.

This particular stand was “manned” by three toe-headed little girls who were clearly determined to make friends with their customers and push their product as the best on the market. I struck up a conversation with these girls, asking them how their business was doing and what they were doing to promote it. At 6, 8 and 10 years of age, they didn’t have too much to share on that front.

Then I explained to these little girls that my friend and I had just written a book about how companies should use technology and that we used a lemonade stand as an example of how even the simplest business can use technology to be more competitive. OK, I’ll admit, this first marketing effort for our book got me three blank stares, but their mother was amused at least!

For the rest of you, just think about that for a second. Could your lemonade stand use a little technology? If you don’t believe it, read the book… or just keep following this blog and I’ll talk about it more.

Over the next few months, Jim and I are both going to be discussing topics from the book on our blogs so we hope you will join in on the conversation!

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