First off, Finder Not Keeper will soon be featured on the site ScoutMob. ScoutMob is one of my favorite places to shop. I like how they provide a platform for independent makers to tell the story behind the product.
However, being featured has one major drawback. Three letters: b-i-o.
In addition to signing contracts and uploading images, I have to submit a short biography, 100 words or less, about myself and Finder Not Keeper.
The first thing I do is google "how to write a bio that doesn't suck." A rather informative article pops up that suggests four paragraphs answering these questions:
Who are you?
How did you get to be who you are?
What are you doing now?
What is your future.
Let's begin with number 3. I am folding napkins.
Number 1 is already posted on the About page of this blog. I am a middle-aged woman who opened an online shop in an effort to stay out of the lives of my children.
Number 4 is easy too. I hope the online shop is successful enough that I can avoid an obituary that reads something like, "She made her bed nicely every day."
But number 2 is tough. Should I explain how I came to hatch this crazy idea of selling sets of things to people who maybe didn't know that they needed sets of things?
Because I tried that recently in a pitch to a PR firm asking them to represent me. I gave them a written blow-by-blow account of how the idea for Finder Not Keeper formed. They have not responded and perhaps it is because a) the story was dull and b) I didn't show good judgment when I submitted it.
Lesson learned. No one cares how you got the idea. They care about what you do with it.
My mind was clouded by one of my most favorite films, Working Girl. Remember that elevator scene where Melanie Griffith's character wins the day by explaining to Oren Trask exactly how she conceived of the merger idea she proposed? And Sigourney Weaver is left sputtering? Gorgeous but sputtering?
So it's back to the keyboard for more drafts. But in the background, I'm listening to this killer track by the beautiful Carly Simon. Hope all you working girls out there enjoy it.