Heather Haddad

As of today, we have closed Fumee’s doors. After a lot of research over the last few months, we found out that we will actually come out ahead financially to close rather than to sell the business. A bit surprising, but true given various complicated factors I won’t go into. I want to take some time to tell my story, and offer a bit more explanation for my customers and supporters. So here we go…

Fumee has been around for four years now, and in that time, I have learned so much. Much of what I learned compelled me to close Fumee. So let’s start there, with the “why.”

There’s no “one” reason we’re closing. Like anything in life the thinking behind this is complex and layered. Some of the reasons are personal. For example, I realized pretty early on that retail was not something I actually enjoyed. As the years passed, and my business acumen grew, I started to yearn for a different type of business, in a different industry altogether. However with a full time job plus running Fumee, it wasn’t feasible to start thinking about another business. I want to move on, and to do so means I need to close this chapter of my life.

Another thing I learned is that although I chose the business I did because of my deep passion for cigars, I didn’t think of the lifestyle implications of owning a brick and mortar. I naively thought I could hire a manager to run it for me and move off to Europe, cashing in my passive income and enjoying life as an absentee owner. I know now that was extremely unrealistic. My ultimate goal in life is to travel, live in Europe and be somewhat nomadic. Fumee did not mesh with this. In fact, Fumee basically sentenced me to live in Texas for as long as Fumee existed, and I no longer wish to live in Texas.

The final personal reason is that I lost my passion. People say you should do something you’re passionate about, but I discovered that when I turned my passion into my work, I started hating it. Instead of associating cigars with something pleasant, I associated them with stress. I actually no longer enjoy cigars like I used to.

Those are the personal reasons, but there are practical ones as well. The first and foremost being: the point of owning a business is to make money, and if you’re not making money, there is no point.

Fumee was not profitable, and as such, was more of an expensive hobby that I was subsidizing instead of a business. This is really the only reason I need.

In spite of not being profitable, we pushed on for years. We did this because we thought we could turn the corner. This was not unrealistic, retail businesses typically need many years to turn their first profit. However, it was only very recently that realized we would never turn that corner, and the reason was because of our fatal mistake: we started Fumee underfunded.

This is perhaps the most valuable lesson I learned. When we were starting Fumee, I had a very hard time getting funding, but I was determined to do it one way or another. We finally did get an SBA loan, but it was woefully small. We were crippled before we even opened our doors. I think we started Fumee with about $75K plus some credit cards. This meant that we were never able to buy enough inventory to make the business profitable. We thought eventually this would correct itself, but we couldn’t ever keep up. It became the chicken and the egg: we could not get sales up without more inventory, and we couldn’t afford more inventory without an increase in sales.

There are a lot of details and nuance here. I will write about this more in other posts. The mistakes we made, the lessons I learned. The frustrations we faced. The difficulty of running a small business.

But ultimately, I know we are making the right choice. It became clear we were throwing good money after bad and it was time to cut our losses and move on.

I am leaving Fumee with a deep respect for any and all business owners. No two ways about it: owning a business is HARD, no matter how simple the business seems. There are a million things to do at all times. The cost of operating is staggering- we were spending $12,000 a month on bills, taxes, payroll, etc… and that still wasn’t enough to keep up. I am also leaving, well, screwed. I will take a big financial hit in the closing process. I never made one penny off Fumee, and I gave it four years of my labor.

But in spite of this, I have no regrets. I received an education that rivals everything I learned getting my MBA. I am wiser. I learned a ton. I learned a lot about myself. I learned a lot about human nature. I got to try my hand at my dream and will never have to wonder “what if?”

This is a bitter-sweet moment. Part of me is sad and depressed- this is my baby that I nurtured for five years. It’s hard to let go. Part of me is stressed- the process of dissolving the corporation and losses we face due to business debts is overwhelming. But I am also excited and happy. I am gaining back tons of time into my daily life. I am reducing my stress. I am starting a new, fresh chapter and I can’t wait to see what’s to come.

So what happens next? Well, for me personally I am hoping (planning?) to leave Austin. Where will I go? I don’t know. I have to explore the possibilities that PayPal has for me to transfer. It’s probably the first time since I was 14 years old that I don’t know exactly what I am going to do next. I’m on a journey and I plan to enjoy the ride.

I’d like to close this by giving a big thank you to everyone who was a part of Fumee. The investors, the employees, the customers. I met some amazing people on this journey, and I will treasure these experiences. For any customers reading this, I hope you will keep checking back- I plan to start blogging more regularly, and to offer more insights on the rise and fall of Fumee. You can keep up with me and my new adventures here.

It was fun,

Heather

All week I’ve been thinking “I need to take better care of myself.”

It’s hard to keep yourself as a priority when you’re busy. I’ve been so, so busy. Lately my hours at my day job have been around 50/week. Then I run a business on top of that. I’m helping my husband edit his next book. Not to mention the daily tasks of just existing: cleaning, paying the bills…

And so, with not enough hours in the day, I’ve neglected the easiest thing to ignore–myself.

Last week I realized I hadn’t eaten a vegetable in a week. For the last three weeks, my first meal of the day typically is dinner. I don’t like breakfast, I’m too busy to have lunch and so by the time I get around to eating, It’s 7 PM and I’m tired and don’t feel like cooking. So I grab whatever is easiest. One week I ate a microwaved potato every day.

I haven’t been taking my vitamins, as ordered by my doctor (I’m anemic), because I don’t have time to pop 4 pills in my mouth. Seriously.

That’s not even the worst of it, I was supposed to start a new birth control pack two days ago, but haven’t had time to call the pharmacy to order it.

Exercise- ha. My normal yoga class keeps getting waylayed by evening work meetings.Shame, because all of this work has been giving me carpel tunnel and I really need to stretch my arms and get off the computer.

So, things have to change.

This week I am going to try hard to put up some boundaries and keep work within working hours as much as possible. I’m going to delegate more. I’m going to make room in my schedule for working out. I’m going to take my lunch break. I’m going to cook my own food. I’m going to treat my body better and stop using the computer in ways that hurt my wrists. I’m going to sleep enough.

I don’t think I’ll be successful at first, but I hope to make some progress. Because I can’t keep going at this pace, feeling like I’m going to have a heart attack from the stress. Having my body feel like a creaky old lady.

Yoga breaths. Meditation. I can do it.

• Arizona
• Alaska (May 2012)
• California
• Colorado
• Florida
• Georgia
• Hawaii
• Illinois
• Indiana
• Louisiana
• Massachusetts
• Minnesota
• Nevada
• New Hampshire
• New Mexico
• New York
• North Carolina
• Oregon
• Texas
• Washington

Reference

Europe

• Hungary
• Slovakia
• Vatican City
• Italy
• Austria
• Germany
• Switzerland
• France
• UK (England)
• Spain

North America

• USA
• Canada
• Mexico
• Nicaragua
• Bahamas

Oceania

• Fiji
• Australia

Reference

Today sucked. It began and ended with a lot of animal mishaps. I had a puking dog, a cat that, like most boys, can’t seem to aim to when peeing, a mouse that refuses to die no matter what sort of trap I set, the poisoning of a wasps nest that my landlord told us to take care of ourselves (sort of negating the point of renting), and, in a more humorous turn of events, the hot-saucing of the cat’s litter box in order to convince the dogs that cat turds are not yummy. That resulted in the dogs eating their kitty turds with little to no reaction, and me tasting the hot sauce to see if it was hot enough and burning my mouth off. Dave’s insanity sauce really is insane, unless you’re a dog, then it’s just a tasty turd topping.

Then there was work. I’ve been pulling long hours at Fumee all week, trying to get my to-do list done before my new job starts, and today started off so badly I became sort of manic and completely unable to concentrate. I was at work until 9 PM but don’t think I got a single thing done. I was extremely upset about our inventory situation. We have a bunch of stuff on the way, but it just can’t possibly get here fast enough, and I am trying my customer’s patience. I know that, and that just makes me frustrated. However annoyed they are, trust me, I am 1,000 times more annoyed. The hardest part is the waiting because there is nothing I can do to make UPS come faster. I hate not being able to rectify this tomorrow.

Then I get home and Anthony has used a whole bottle of toilet bowl cleaner on our toilet trying to get the urinal smell out. Who the heck thought it would be a fine design for a toilet to have a lip in the bowl that catches pee and is nearly impossible to clean? It’s the stupidest toilet I’ve ever seen. I asked my landlord for a new one. She thinks it is unnecessary. Speaking of stupid inventions, I just cannot stop thinking about how to keep the dogs out of the litter box. I’m on my third litter box cover/dog=deterrent prototype, and this one isn’t working. If you’re wondering why this is so hard, our dogs are smaller than our cat, so they can get into tiny spaces, and one of our dogs is very agile and can jump almost as high as the cat. When I finally figure it out, I should win the Nobel Prize for inventions. Today’s brainstorming session yielded an idea that involved an elaborate pulley system, and one that involved creating a cat-run out the window. Anyone out there have an idea?

Well, here’s hoping tomorrow is better. I know at least that everything work related will be better by the end of next week. I’ve just got to make it till then!

Today my grandma passed away.

Grandma Shidlow wasn’t my blood relative. She was my mom’s step-mom, but I grew up knowing her as grandma and I always thought I was lucky to have three grandmas when everyone else only got two.

I haven’t seen her since I was 13. My grandfather grew afraid to travel as he aged and so they stopped coming to see us. We used to visit them in Boston a lot when I was a kid, but at some point we stopped going.

I have only small memories of her, most predominantly, her laugh. She was a smoker and she had a great, loud smoky laugh that I loved. I remember that she always wore a gold snake bracelet and necklace with ruby eyes that my grandfather had given her. When I was a kid I would point at them and hiss like a snake. When my grandfather died my grandma sent them to me with a note saying that she felt too sad to wear them anymore and she wanted me to have them.

Even though we didn’t see each other a lot, I always made an effort to keep in touch. I wrote handwritten letters to her often and emailed. I usually didn’t get a response, but I kept writing anyways, imagining that she might like to read my letters and learn more about me. One year, I realized that I couldn’t think of anything to get her for Christmas because I had no idea what she liked. So I sent her a bouquet of flowers. To my surprise I got a thank you note from her saying she loved them. That was the first time I had ever gotten a thank you note from my grandma so I figured it was something she really liked. I tried to send her flowers for Christmas every year afterwards as I could afford it.

This year, I gave her a copy of our family tree that I had been working on. When researching my grandfather’s side of the family, I emailed Grandma Shidlow for some leads. She told me what she knew, but it wasn’t much. I was left with many questions as I dug into that side of my family, and I really wished I had asked my grandfather before he died. I was glad my Grandmother was still around to ask, and this led me to plan a trip to go visit her. I included a note with my Christmas gift, indicating that Anthony and I were going to New York this spring and that we wanted to take the train to visit her while we were there. Unfortunately, our trip isn’t for a few more months, and now she’s no longer with us.

Grandma died of a recurrence of her breast cancer, which she had already beat once. We didn’t even know it had come back, she didn’t tell us or even her own brother. I wish we had known.

Saturday I leave for the funeral in New Hampshire. I am meeting my mother there. It is sure to be a difficult trip. Today has been a tough day and I am feeling sad and depressed. I hope, at least, that I made her happy and that my notes through the years meant something to her. I hope she knew that even though she wasn’t my blood grandma, I always thought of her as my real grandma. I hope that at the funeral I might learn some more about her. And I regret not taking the initiative to visit her sooner, because now it is too late.

Today is my 7th day on the diet. I only lost 1 lb. I was very diligent on the diet. I am totally bummed, but I am hoping that the problem is that the scale I used for my starting weight was broken at the gym when I went on Saturday so I had to use a different one. Maybe the readings are different. Today I am going to yoga and if the scale is fixed I will check my weight again. One note on cheat day: I’ve read some other people’s blogs who are doing 4HB, and they bitch and moan about cheat day. “It made me feel so gross” “It gave me a headache” “I wish I could skip it.” I call BS on that. Cheat day was the best day of my life. I ate almost a whole pizza, ice cream and a cupcake. It was heaven. I did not feel bad afterwards at all. Also to the people who say they don’t have any cravings on 4HB, again, BS. I crave cheese daily.  That brings me to today’s tip: good snack food.

Tip #3: Delicious Snacks

Since the 4 Hour Body is not about counting calories or feeling deprived, you can eat all you want, as long as it’s approved food. I found that I get hungry faster because the food I’m eating isn’t as heavy. So, let me introduce you to my favorite snack.

Blue Diamond Salt and Vinegar Almonds

These babies taste just like potato chips. They are awesome (Check out the amazon reviews). There’s a few things to look out for- don’t over indulge. Being nuts, these are very fatty. A little goes a long way. (I am guilty of over indulging on these, they are so darn yummy!) Also, I noticed there is lactose in the ingredients, which is the thing Tim wants you to avoid in dairy (although a commenter on his blog later cited a study saying it was the whey in dairy that you should avoid). Either way, it’s probably an insignificant amount. However I will check out some other nut brands to see if there’s a better option. Remember to read those labels! Case in point: I discovered that my black beans have sugar in them! I will have to find a brand of beans that doesn’t contain sugar or I will have to switch to dried beans.

Tip #2: Making Eggs Less Disgusting

I don’t really like eggs. Since I don’t eat meat, and this diet is predicated on eating lots of protein, specifically two eggs for breakfast each day, I am now finding creative ways to make eggs not taste disgusting. I do eat eggs, just IN things. Not plain. Maybe five times a year I’ll do an omlette or scrambled eggs with tons of cheese (guess what? No cheese allowed on this diet!)

This is the hardest part of the diet for me so far. Forcing myself to choke down eggs. That, and eating within thirty minutes of waking, which I have thus far failed at every single day.

So for I’ve found the following to work alright to make eggs more palatable to me- scrambling them VERY well done and drowning them in other things (like beans) so I can’t taste them or notice the texture. I’ve also discovered hollandaise sauce, which I love, to be a great, 4HB approved, way to get some eggs in me (as long as I don’t under cook it, like I did today, making it difficult for me to finish my breakfast due to being grossed out.) I am now considering how I can cook eggs into things so I am getting them without noticing, but this might be tricky to do with no carbs.

Here is a meal I’ve been eating for breakfast and sometimes lunch:

2 eggs, scrambled WELL (1 egg with yolk, 1 without. The eggs are organic). Dump in a bowl and add a cup of microwaved canned black beans that has been seasoned with taco seasoning from a pouch. Add sauteed spinach. Top with fresh salsa. Eat.

It’s not too bad, but I am already bored of eating so many beans. Today I plan to grocery shop and think of new creative meals I can make that won’t be so “one-note”. One hiccup is that I noticed my salsa is sweetened with Agave Nectar (nothing sweetened allowed on this diet), so when it’s gone I will have to switch to a new brand. I am going to finish this kind off though, because it wasn’t cheap, and it’s really good. =)

Tim says that studies show the most successful dieters eat the same thing every day. This helps you stick to the diet because it removes the thought process out of eating, and makes preparation easy. Since that sounds pretty dull over a long period of time, I figured I would eat the same meal plan for a week, and then switch to a new menu to liven it up. However, here on day three I am already finding out that I can only take so much beans, spinach and egg for every meal, so odds are I’m going to be experimenting more than initially thought.

Today I begin the 4 Hour Body. It’s a diet/workout plan by Tim Ferriss, who wrote the 4 Hour Workweek, which I love. The plan is what my husband calls, “stupid” because a very coarse summary of it could be: lose 20 lbs in 1 week, don’t eat any fruit, sugar or carbs that are white (or could be white), cheat once a week, and only work out for 1 hr a week.

I agree, it sounds a little too good to be true. Low carb diets are shown to work, but at a detriment to your health. This is basically a riff on that, but with some scientific background about what foods cause what reactions in your body. It should also be noted that Tim Ferriss is not a doctor of any kind. Not even a nutritionist. Just a businessman, actually.

So why am I doing it? Ah, why not? I want to see if it will work, because if it does: Best. Diet. Ever. (only 1 hr a week in the gym? Yes, please!). And, well that’s pretty much it. I’m curious.

So today I begin. I am committed to trying this for 1 month to see if I see any results. It should be noted that I am a lacto-ovo-vegetarian, so my meals will be meat free as well (I am NOT giving up soy, like Tim suggests, because I doubt I can stick with the diet if I do, and I think it’s more important to try to stick with it, than to worry about supposed ill effects of soy). I will be posting my tips and tricks along the way. Here’s the first:

Tip #1 Drinking Enough Water

I am not really a water drinker. I don’t drink much of anything really, except coffee. But part of the diet is to drink a lot of water, and you are also encouraged to consume citrus, so here is my solution that I’ve been trying out for the last week or so. I take a small plastic jug and fill it with tap water and then I squeeze half a lemon in it and half a lime. Chill in the fridge and consume.

This makes about two 16oz servings. Which means I should drink two of these a day. I have found I can do about 1 and half a day with no problem. The addition of the citrus is nice and refreshing and it makes me actually want to drink water. In the future, I plan to add cucumber and mint to the second batch to mix it up.

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