This morning, we received an email from one of our suppliers informing us that they're shutting down until April 1 at the earliest.
Thankfully, it's not a major supplier and we do have a backup plan, but this prompted me to write our actual major supplier to place a just-in-case order (I'm always shoving aces up my sleeves whenever I can), and that's how I found out that amid all this craziness, our main bottle supplier suffered damage from the earthquake in Utah, and they're assessing the damage.
My heart went out to them -- not only are we in the grips of a panic about a pandemic, and their primary suppliers for bottles are in China, but then an earthquake hit them? Eesh. Rough times.
I assured them that we could wait a couple weeks on that bottle order (our company policy is to be kind to all our suppliers), and sent my condolences.
After checking in with a totally different supplier, we found out that two of our other major shipments have been delayed due to weather.
And then, as if on cue, a blizzard rolled in and is presently dumping about 5" of snow on Reno.
So yeah, shit's been hitting every available fan.
But at the same time, we got this wonderful and kind message from one of our friends and customers:
"I just wanted to reach out to wish you all well during this difficult time. It is my sincere hope that y'all will be able to continue to operate. You are my kind of people and I send each and every one of you my heartfelt best wishes."
And yeah, things are pretty much the pinnacle of bizarro suckage right now, but -- and brace yourself, because this is going to sound cheesy as all get-out -- at least we have each other.
The gang at the workshop has been super close (not literally, since we're all keeping our social distance) and supportive of the business and our customers during this challenging time. And we've been so grateful to have your support and compassion on this rough ride.
It's hard to know what the future will hold. We are making our business adjustments as best we can. We're no strangers to hard work and belt tightening, so this is just more work and more tightening.
We have no intention of going anywhere. So as far as any of us know, you're stuck with us.
If you want to help out our little business and keep yourself in some darn fine scents at the same time, consider subscribing to one of our new (and particularly timely) Clean Getaway subscriptions. They're especially engineered for this type of situation: Get your favorite soap (or body wash), deodorant, lotion, and cologne on the regular, at a nice savings, without having to touch even one germy check-out counter.
Not only will you get your favorites without all that pesky ordering, you'll also help us build a solid foundation to brace ourselves in these weird times.
But either way, no pressure. We're just glad to be going through this with the awesomest folks we know (that's you!).
