It’s a trend I see more and more – people using a robust, easily modified CMS to power their online experience. I use WordPress for just about everything I do online – my blog, my companie websites, etc.

The only exception to this is the forums I run at http://www.paintball.net.nz – where we are using vBulletin – but again that is another robust CMS system.

Well that appears to be working – and we’re posting some fantastic growth figures (albeit off of a base that wasn’t ‘woohoo’ material to start with.  Hell next week alone we’ve got 400 people booked in across the 7 days to come and play paintball with us at TAG.

And that’s good numbers on a New Zealand standard.

So we’ve decided to mix it up a little, and next year we will be exibiting at the Armageddon Expo in Wellington.  It should be a bit of a laugh – we’re looking forward to it a lot – and the ideas of what we can do with our stand are flowing thick and fast.

I’ll try and post up a couple of times about what we’re doing in that space – but we’ve only got around 4 months to get it finalised.  The show is April 2/4 2010 – so book sometime out and see what’s happening.

One of the things that I’ve always hoped they would do is introduce a personal book keeping system (a la MS Money) that has the same amazing functionality that the business product does.

Well Rod Drury (CEO) has recently announced this on the Xero blog.  (Followed closely by Orange Girl on their twitter feed).

To say I can’t wait for it to go live in early 2010 is an understatement – the functionality of what it will delivery in terms of us being able to truely see what is happening to our money (in a simple, graphical way) without needing to have create spreadsheets or the like.

If you’d like to see a (quick) video on the product here you go:

Thats crazy

It’s been a long 12 months to be fair.

For most of that time I’ve been running two fulltime jobs and trying to fix a business that was in a dreadful state when we took it over.  In that time I’ve been made redundant, had some family issues that have had to be dealt with – and generally been moving from one crisis to another.  I understand more fully the rollercoaster of emotions that I have heard people speak of around owning your own business.

The field is in a much stronger place now then it was when we took over.  We’ve upgraded all of the equipment, purchased a new (more efficient) vehicle – and taken major inroads into fixing the damaged relationships that the previous owners had left for us to inherit.

The next 12 months for us are key.  We have the tools, and the systems now to get things moving – we’re planning the marketing push for summer and with any luck we’ll be able to start seeing the fruits of our labour.  Having time to focus on the business since leaving NZ Post has been great – but there are still lots to be done.

I guess that we’ll see how things go from here.  But I know now that (like having children) no matter how much you know it’s going to be hard, that it’s going to take sacrifice to make it work – you really have no idea until you take the plunge and commit to something like this.

Whatever.  I’m still here.

You can check out http://www.dontquityourdayjob.co.nz if you’re at all interested.

You get all sorts on the field – asking for freebies, discounts – anything that can be asked has been asked.  We’ve got standard responses to most questions that people ask – but they do always get asked.

I’ve started doing the same sort of thing with my suppliers – a couple below for your reference:

Q – Would you like to advertise in our magazine? (Targetting a key demographic at a key time of year for us)

A – Sure, but only if you ensure that we are the only Wellington based paintball field that does.

Result – We’re advertising (with a quarter page ad) and will be the only Wellington paintball field in there.

Q – We’re going to have you pay the advertising bill in one installment (from a large corporate we advertise with)

A – How about we spread those payments out over a year?

Result – We’re spreading the payments over 10 months (or so), but have to move to direct debit (happy with that)

End of the day the message is clear – especially in these trying economic time – try and negiotate with your suppliers for more favourable terms, small discounts.  Be prepared to give a little as well – but it will make things easier in the long run.

It’s nice – but would like to have some science around it. Heck at this stage the last month of winter will be as big as one of our summer months. Maybe we’re doing something right for a change Either way I need a lot more paint – and if it don’t arrive on time tomorrow then I could be stuffed

Saw Stick for a coffee – we talked shop. He joins the ranks of the out of contract/unemployeed (as so many of us have lately) in a few weeks. It’s almost like there’s a recession or something on.

Should be fun. I hope.