My professional life has been spent primarily in business, specifically in marketing. Even during the several years when I was singing professionally, I worked as a freelance consultant writing market research surveys and reports for companies like American Express, Saab, Aetna and Wachovia. Because my focus was direct marketing, I had to make sure that marketing and advertising expenditures were producing real, quantifiable results. If a marketing effort isn’t creating long-term profit, then there’s no sense continuing to invest in it.
My first significant job was as a Marketing Manager for Better Homes and Gardens Book Clubs, and that’s where I learned the value of niche marketing. Rather than have one large book club (like Book-of-the-Month Club), we had clubs for cooks, for crafters, for “country” decorators, for hunters and handymen. The business model was successful because of the customer loyalty built by offering a quality product to a small but highly interested market. My later experience at OgilvyOne (the direct marketing arm of Ogilvy & Mather Advertising Agency) confirmed the value of target marketing to specific niches.
When you offer an unique product, one that is not easily replicated and one that a portion of the market is passionate about, your business is less susceptible to attacks from competitors and is more likely to weather well the ups and downs of the general economy. So when the opportunity arose to purchase an existing guesthouse that targeted a niche market and had an 11-year history of loyal clientele in a destination known for the diversity of its lodging options, my business partner and I felt it would be a wise business decision to take the opportunity.
And the decision has proven to be a wise one. Over the past 8 years, the business has continued to grow. Through significant physical renovations (including one that earned us an award for Excellence in Historic Rehabilitation from the Historic Florida Keys Foundation) and the expansion of the business through the addition of a patio bar and a more robust restaurant, our guesthouse for women has become the leading such niche property in the world.
I’ve been chided by supporters that “guesthouse” is an understatement. We have 38 rooms and suites, a bar, a restaurant, two pools, two hot tubs, and a full- and part-time staff of 19. We struggle with common challenges facing Keys business owners: meeting payroll; providing health insurance (which we do for our full-timers); finding responsible employees (actually, we’ve been lucky in this regard); maintaining the physical property; complying with regulations; managing the impact of hurricanes; increasing revenues enough to keep pace with increasing costs; and, of course, paying taxes.
One of the ways we’ve been successful, and ways in which most successful businesses thrive, is by listening to customer needs and responding sensibly to them. We survey our guests and work on improvements they suggest on a regular basis. If you don’t respond to the market, the market will go elsewhere — and if you’re an elected official and you don’t respond to your constituents, the voters will go elsewhere, too.
While there are ways in which government is not a business (its essential services must be provided for without regard for profit), there are skills and lessons I’ve learned in business that apply to being a County Commissioner. Certainly, the ability to read and understand a budget is top among them. Identifying quality employees, motivating them and equipping them with what they need to do their jobs is another. Managing many moving parts, and understanding how decisions can have impacts beyond their immediate circumstances is another. Recognizing that it is the contribution of many individual and diverse entities that makes the whole successful is another. Understanding that responding to the market, to customers or, in the case of government, to constituents, is yet another — and perhaps the most important in a democracy.
The breadth of my professional experience, from working in major corporations to being a freelancer to owning a business, is part of what makes me best-suited to be your next Commissioner from District 3. That and my proven record of leadership and public service in organizations that have benefited many in the Keys, demonstrate my ability to represent all of Monroe’s citizens. I hear your concerns because I’ve lived them. As Frazier would say, “I’m listening.” And that’s just good business.
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