Chairman’s Blog Thursday 11th April 2019.

A bright morning with full daylight at 6am had the Members turning up in there droves.  What’s a drove I hear you asking, well this week it was 26 members and one visitor.

This week we had asked everybody to find a different seat to the one they usually occupy.  A compliant lot we are at EBF and everybody, even the top table obliged…apart from the Naughty Corner.  Still, I guess they take every opportunity to earn their reputation.

New Member Induction

We had the added bonus of a new member induction.  This time Dan Wright has now officially become the new boy; welcome Dan.

The Performance League

After the first meeting Matt Barry is in the lead.  He has however given us all a chance by being away on holiday this week.

Education Presentation

Delivered by Howard Bullock, he was supported by fellow members of the Naughty Corner; Paul Booth and Dean Caldon.  Like the three stooges they held up a card each with a different price on it.  These represented a price per month and might represent gold silver and bronze prices for different levels of service to be provided by businesses looking to provide an ongoing service.  Where part of the services being offered might not be necessary to the particular punter we had the glorious descriptive phrase “nice to haves”.  This is a close relation to the “must haves”.  It sounded like a surgical case from Brave New World.  It sort of turned into a presentation that, if it had gone on any longer, some of us would have lost the will to live.  But as it was pitched about right it provided an interesting side show at the beginning of the meeting.  If only Ashley Bermange had presented them with their Naughty Corner T Shirts earlier…

The 60 Second Round

Richard Reed always gets upset if he is not mentioned so here goes!  He sent out by email a really good offer last week.  He did not ask for a show of hands as to who had seen it, but our ears certainly pricked up when he mentioned an underwater restaurant.  This restaurant would presumably make the discerning clams clustering outside the glass dome to wonder how good the “human chowder” might be.

Toby Acton continued the use of imagery by declaring that he sold “light bulbs”, these being the moments that occur in some of his workshops.  A modification of this imagery might be that he provides “route maps” showing the road to Damascus.

Nick Cooke also was creating imagery by referring to “sagging roofs and chimney breasts”, or maybe it wasn’t imagery  but simply a reference to roofs and chimney breasts separately.

Ben Golding’s pitch was that his product offered services that people could not live without.

The metaphors continued apace with Stuart Smallcombe likening the services that he could provide to ordering scrambled egg and smoked salmon for breakfast in the morning.  If it’s sustainability you are looking for, he’s your man.

The Mayor of Gants Hill has been around for a long time and he is worldly wise.  This week’s gem of wisdom was to make sure your flyers are printed on both sides… something to do with how they land on the mat.

Saj Sreedharan was promoting flowers for commiseration occasions.  He mentioned bereavement arising from a death and finished up with flowers for a lady who had recently been burgled,  Attending the premises with the flowers but wearing a hoody I suspect was something of a mixed message.

John Freeman was celebrating taking delivery of his new white van.

Brian Painter had returned refreshed and bronzed from his recent holiday. He told of a 24 year old lady who kept on imagining being in a road accident.  This anxiety produced a coping strategy of not driving.  Our Pilgrim assaulted her subconscious to the extent that she is now driving around without a care in the world.  Driving on our roads without a care in the world is capable of proving a self-fulfilling prophesy.

Paul Booth declared that he was looking for people like John Freeman and Allan Moller.  That means people who are self-employed and who are looking for a quick in and out.  As the last contribution by a member, it kind of left us all with one question……..why? Why people like “Odd Job and the Spark” when you can go for the real thing.

John Hammond was awarding the Oscar this week and he had a much earlier task than normal, Scott Griffiths illustrated his virtual team with print outs of the male and female superheroes who enabled him to do his job.  He referred to them as tools.  I am sure they have redeeming features and it certainly enabled him to quite properly claim the Oscar this week.

This weeks statistics and points of note

• 26 Members present
• 1 Visitor
• 26 referrals passed
• £27,750.00 worth of business recorded
• Scott Griffiths won the Oscar

10-minute presentation by Jill Willis

The pressures of parenthood brought Jill in the meeting in a bit of a clatter but this and the accompanying slid show amply illustrated her professionalism.  Her use of projection was also entirely apposite.  Not hundreds of photographs but one main slide that produced a diagram that very effectively allowed her to illustrate how she can guide businesses in the selling of their product.  Excellent.

Sartorial Note

I have ignored matters sartorial hitherto in 2019 but this week I cannot resist; Nick Cooke was dressed as a lumber jack and Jill was a leopard.