The waiting game

Yesterday was my presentation in front of a jury to try to gain a spot in one of the largest Christmas gift shows in Ottawa. I knew going into this that my biggest challenge would be to get the jurors to think a little outside the box.

There was a 3 person jury, which in itself was not intimidating. However, the set up was not designed to put the presenters at ease. The room had one long table set up running the length of the room, with the 3 jurors sitting at it. There was a second long table running the length of the room directly opposite with about 10 feet between. When I entered the room, no one stood. I wasn't sure what the protocol was, but I went over and shook everyone's hand. I was asked to display my products on the second table, and then to give them a verbal history of the business. I didn't feel too nervous (yes, I was nervous but just a healthy sort of nervousness) and I don't think I could have presented anything any better than I did. I've gone over and over everything in my mind, and I can't think of any "I should have said this" or "I should have done that".

However, I'll be very very surprised if I get into this show. My biggest stumbling block was that none of the 3 people were "dog people". The concept of all natural & healthy dog biscuits didn't seem to interest anyone. The concept of people eating the dog biscuits kind of horrified them, even after I explained the ingredients. Yes, I know that eating dog biscuits is kind of weird. But look at the ingredients for my peanut butter biscuits: natural peanut butter (that's only crushed peanuts...nothing else), whole wheat flour, rolled oats, skim milk, and baking soda. Seriously, it's a peanut butter cookie without sugar or salt. They're good! (yes, I eat them when I'm packing biscuits and I get hungry. So far, I don't bark too often!)

I passed around an open bag of biscuits for the jurors to smell, and one of them didn't even want to smell the biscuits. This was definitely an uphill battle. The biscuits I passed around to smell were my Crunch for a Cure biscuits (raising funds for breast cancer research). The ingredients are: cranberry juice, rice flour, rolled oats, egg, baking soda, allspice. The allspice give the biscuits a lovely smell.

Anyway, at the end of my presentation one of the jurors gave me a 5 minute speech about how if they don't accept me into the show it's no reflection on my business or my products. Hmmm. Should I be reading something into this speech? We'll see.

There are 20 open spots and 80 people applying for them. We're supposed to hear from them early in June. Here's hoping for jurors who want to try something new!