Mike had a dozen phone messages and thirty emails when he got to his desk, about various projects the firm was involved in. He forgot about Brooke’s for the time being, although when he thought about the brown suede shoes he was sorry he hadn’t bought them. But he could easily see why Jenny loved the store, and why his mother remembered it so well fifty years later. It really was a very special place.
When Mike left the store, Spencer walked around for a few more minutes to finish her morning tour and went back to her office. Her CFO, Paul Trask, called her a few minutes later and asked to come to see her.
She greeted him warmly when he walked in, and wondered what he had on his mind. He did an excellent job as their chief financial officer. He was one of her new hires when her father died and she became CEO. He was very effective at running the store’s finances, investing her money, and advising her. Paul dealt with Spencer’s mother on a regular basis. Eileen continued to get more and more difficult as she got older. She was lonely without Tucker. She was seventy-five now, and not aging well. Physically she was fine, but she was unhappy and depressed and always complaining about something, and terrified the money would run out. She had no faith in Spencer’s ability to run the store competently, and was sure she’d run it aground and they’d wind up penniless. That wasn’t even a remote possibility, and Paul was patient about reassuring Eileen frequently that all was well.
“How’s my mother?” Spencer asked him with a look of concern when he sat down across from her. He had far more patience with Eileen than her own daughter did. But Eileen was much kinder to him than she was to Spencer, to whom she constantly predicted doom, and disapproved of everything she did.
“About the same. The poor thing is so sad. I tried to get her to come into the store for tea, so she could see how well we’re doing, and she always refuses. She said it makes her too sad to come here. She says it’s not the same without your dad running the store.”
“That’s true,” Spencer said with a sigh. It had taken them five years to get over the bad investments Tucker had made, and recoup most of the money. It was easier to replace the brands he had canceled. And the atmosphere in the store was much warmer and more congenial since Spencer had been running it, and more like her grandfather’s time. “She sees disaster heading toward us around every corner. She thinks I don’t know what I’m doing.” Eileen made no secret of it, and Spencer heard it from her all the time. “She thinks I’m too much like my grandfather,” Spencer said with a smile. That was a compliment at least.
“I wanted to come and talk to you,” Paul said, “because we’re really on an even keel now. The store is doing well, our investments are solid. I’d like to see us expand though, to reach out to new clients, and bring in younger customers. We have the merchandise they want. They just don’t know it. I think we should do more advertising. In the press and online. I’d like to see us set up a website people could shop from. Everyone does that now. It’s a major moneymaker.”
“If we do that, they won’t come into the store,” Spencer said, worried.
“Some people can’t anyway. They live too far away, or they’re not well. We’d capture a whole new group of customers with online shopping. Just about every store in the world does that, but we don’t. It’s fine for the store to look ‘vintage’ and a little old-fashioned, but we can’t afford to be old-fashioned in our marketing practices. I’d really like you to give it some thought. We could even expand into an annex if we can find a building nearby and put certain departments there. But if we start buying real estate, we should bring in an investor.” Spencer looked horrified at the suggestion. It had been suggested occasionally over the years that they should consider moving the store uptown, and Spencer was vehemently against it. Her theory was that if she brought in investors, she’d lose control.
“You know how I feel about investors, Paul. I’m not giving up a fraction of a percent of the business. We keep it all.”
“An investor, with enough money, could help us expand without straining our own finances.” She knew that her P&L statement was looking good, their profits and losses.
“I’m not spending a penny we can’t afford ourselves. Bringing in young people is important, and I agree with you. I want to think about online shopping. We’d need more staff to service it. But an annex is an interesting possibility, if we can afford it.”
“I like the concept,” Paul said to her. “What I don’t like is the neighborhood. I’m not sure we can find a decent building here. One day we may need to think about moving uptown if we want to expand.”
“That’s not even a remote possibility. Brooke’s belongs here. It’s part of our cachet, and what makes us different. Besides, we own the building free and clear. Why would we give that up, and have to spend a fortune either buying or renting a store uptown? It doesn’t make good financial sense.”
“Maybe it does. We would carry a lot more merchandise and more lines with a bigger structure to work from. I know these are big issues, Spencer, but they deserve your serious consideration, or we’re going to stay too small, and lose a ton of money we could make if you’d be flexible about some of these issues.”
“I won’t be flexible about moving, or an investor. You can have anything else.” She smiled at him. He’d had the same discussion with her before, and always got the same answer. “My grandfather and father didn’t have investors,” she reminded him, “and the store is much more profitable now than it was in their days.”
“That’s true,” Paul said, “but times have changed, Spencer. We have to expand if we want to keep growing, and we need help to do that. We can’t do it alone.”
“Then we’ll do what we can, without breaking with tradition, or breaking the bank.”
“People very commonly give up a percentage these days, even a small one, to bring in an influx of money. That’s how it’s done.”
“Never!” she said emphatically. Paul knew he’d gotten as far as he would for one day. She was adamant about following the model her grandfather had established. Paul thought she did it out of both loyalty and fear, afraid to try something new. She was young, but she was steeped in the past, after growing up at her grandfather’s knee, and learning everything from him. They had adored each other.
Paul decided to take one last shot at it on his way out. “From everything I know about your grandfather, he was never afraid of change, and always willing to try innovative techniques. You won’t be failing him if you take on an investor. Give it some thought,” Paul urged her.
“I have, and I won’t,” she said, her expression set in stone. He left her office a minute later, hoping that what he had said to her would sink in over time and she’d agree. She was too smart and too good in business not to see things his way eventually. They needed to expand to stay viable in the market, and the only way to do that significantly was with someone else’s money. There was no doubt in Paul’s mind. Nor in Spencer’s.