Bootstrapping BIOLYTE: Western Tour Journal

Dear Lyters, 

Over the past three weeks, I’ve visited BIOLYTE’s distributor partners in California, Colorado, New Mexico and topped it all off at Expo West. Before I headed out on BIOLYTE’s Western Tour, one of my Leaders asked me if she felt like BIOLYTE was “regressing” because I was “having” to go back out into the market. 

I found this question so profound. 

I totally saw where she was coming from. If the company’s CEO is out selling in displays and teaching distributor reps how to sell BIOLYTE, will that look like we can’t afford to send anyone else? Shouldn’t there be more important, head honcho things for me to be doing? Would we look small? 

Here’s my response to this: Visiting new markets is THE MOST IMPORTANT thing I can be doing. It’s what I SHOULD have been doing for the past few years. 

There was an analogy I heard about a team a while back. Picture a group of people in a rainforest together trying to get home. Most of the team needs to be on the ground floor cutting through the thick trees with machetes, but you need one person that climbs to the top of a tree to peer out and make sure sure headed in the right direction. Otherwise, you’ll be cutting and cutting and may be cutting yourself into circles. 

I liked this analogy. It helped me understand that I needed to be the one thinking big, seeing where we were going and making sure we were on the right track. 

But what I’ve found over the past few years is that if you don’t climb down from the tree every now and then, you can't know if the team needs new machetes. You can’t see if the trees have turned into thick vines that can’t be cut with what we’ve got. You can’t see who your team has met along the way and how they’re getting along – maybe they’ve run into some pretty hostile tribes...?

And yes, they should have been yelling up the tree “Hey lady! There are some pretty gnarly vines down here! We haven’t seen these before. Kindly move your fanny and get down here!” But if they’re the hard working, G.S.D. people you know they are, they’re just going to keep chopping until their hands are raw because they truly believe, “The tree watcher probably has more important, head honcho things to do. I should just figure this out.”

This is why climbing down the tree, picking up a machete and chopping the landscape side by side with your team is so important. You get to experience what is working, what is not, and what has changed since you first started. 

“Things happen gradually and then suddenly.” I learned my lesson that things can get off track when I’m glued to my deck at headquarters when our business is happening out in retail. This is why I believe some of the best use of my time is visiting our markets, meeting with our new partners and building the brand side by side with my incredible team. 

Can’t wait to get back out there again. 🗡️🌴

Much love,