A toast: to puzzles and progress!

I’ve had plenty of experience with startups of the virtual variety. Now, with LaunchPad Coworking, I’m looking at a project that combines bricks, mortar, food, and code.

Being a fan of puzzles of all kinds, I’m enjoying figuring out how to best put together a project that includes pieces running the gamut from how crusty should the bread be for the tuna sandwich? to reviewing the marketing plan to lease negotiation and hiring. If this were an actual jigsaw puzzle, let’s just say it’d have 15,000 pieces. At least.

I decided to kick this thing off right. Which is to say, first things first and all, the piece I chose to begin with was: identifying the proper champagne glasses. They’re more likely to be Prosecco glasses, actually, but I can’t bring myself to call them bubbly glasses, even though they have those cool bubbles in the stem. Anyway, it’s not like I purposefully made this The Most Important First Decision — it just happened that way. And I’m justifying this as a good way to set intent — planning our grand opening toast.

I really am loving the incredible variety of things I get to contemplate. One morning I’m focused on streamlining the UI for the admin view of the reservations page, and the next day I’m evaluating espresso equipment. I wasn’t sure how much I’d get into figuring out the cafe end of things, but I’m finding it fascinating. It’s really interesting to try to figure out where best to place what equipment so that the workers can move around, prep, and get things done efficiently. (Until now, It never occurred to me to think about the fact that the reason some small places have only one beer on tap is because kegs take up a lot of space.)

Reevaluating timing has also been an eye opener. You’d think that considering a menu and conducting tastings now — with our opening months a way — would be at the bottom of the to-do list. Not so. To best design the café’s kitchen, we have to know what we’re serving before we can pick out equipment, place said equipment conveniently, and allow for efficient physical maneuvering that lets us manage high traffic.
And determining the right Point of Sale system has presented challenges, to put it mildly. Looking at what’s available makes me feel like I’m having to choose between a bronchial infection and a serious stomach flu—there just aren’t any options I’m thrilled to commit to. (Which makes me want to revert to my earlier association for the acronym POS.. piece of…)

I’m very much a finger-in-every-pot manager, a complete believer in knowing as much as I can. This feeds my lifetime love of learning as much as it helps me be a better CEO because I want to be able to discuss everything from our architecture to our cappuccino philosophy machine in depth.

Still, I know the value of delegating — which is why I’ve assembled a team of seasoned pros to work with me. I’m a fan of that old saying about how you don’t need to know all of the answers, you just need to know where to find them.

Most days my attitude resides in the land of excited anticipation. Some days this edges toward impatience. Like a little kid wanting to read before knowing the alphabet, I’m really eager to swing the doors open and launch LaunchPad Coworking. But before I can do that, I’m just accepting the fact that there has to be a lot of anticlimactic stuff.

For example, location. I am so itching to tell everyone where we’ll be, how we figured it out, and some of what I have learned about some of the people involved in commercial real estate, which, frankly, hasn’t been pretty. But for now, mum’s the word.

Now and then, when things aren’t going smoothly and rapidly forward and there feels like outside forces are trying to slow me down, then yes, I get really frustrated. The day-to-day progress speed bumps start to feel like obstacles rather than challenges. Then I remember that this is all part of the journey. We’re getting to where we need to be. Soon enough we’ll be there, returning to that first puzzle piece I picked up, those lovely glasses, waiting for the first toast.