Company Blog

Tough Enough?

by Adam Zack — February 5, 2019

Great leaders find a way to humanize their toughness.

My daily commute involves a one-hour train ride each way. I get comments on how long that is or how I must hate the long days. I actually really love it. Leave home at 6:15 in the morning and walk in the door at home at 6:15 at night. It’s a great routine. So besides just sitting there looking at the California coast, I use my commute time to catch up on old TV series that I want to re-watch. It’s Sopranos right now, but before that it was Breaking Bad.There was one scene where Walter White was buying the carwash [so he can launder the drug money] from this bushy eyed Romanian named Bogdan. When he’s handing over the keys, Bogdan tells Walt that to be the boss, you have to be tough, and he doesn’t think Walt is tough enough (little did he know). Sometimes, when you’re the boss, you have to be the bad guy. You have to be the a-hole. And for most of us being the tough guy doesn’t come naturally.I know you know plenty of very successful business people who are ruthlessly tough. It seems the only thing they really care about is making sure that first nickel they made stays polished. They are successful, in a monetary wealth way, because of their toughness. The ...

by Adam Zack — January 30, 2019

Sometime fear causes us not to act.

The greatest fear I ever felt in my life happened about 15 years ago. I was babysitting my two nephews one weekend. They were about 8 and 6 years old. I lived in Palm Desert, California, so the weather was either nice or hot. It was warm enough to swim, and I had a pool and spa. With the back doors open, the boys were running around pretty much being boys. I had girls, so was not quite used to full-speed all the time and volume up to 11 that comes with boys.One second they were there, and the next I couldn’t find them. I go out to the pool and spa, and there at the bottom of the spa is my oldest nephew. I did not freeze in terror. I jumped in fully clothed and grabbed him, thinking ahead to my next steps of CPR and calling 911. I pull him up and the little bastard blinks, looks at me and tells me he was just holding his breath and playing. He still laughs about it today. Fear sometimes causes us to act, but more often in everyday non-emergency situations, fear causes us not to act. But what would you do if fear was not an option and it was OK to fail? You might think most people would haphazardly go about making carefree, spontaneous choices. What do they have to lose, it’s OK to fail, right? I d...

by Adam Zack — January 23, 2019

I have received blessings one-hundredfold.

This is a true story. Monday was Martin Luther King day and last night I had a dream. I had a very realistic dream. It was so meaningful to me, I got up and typed out the bullet points on my phone so I would not forget my dream. I didn’t want it to go to the black hole where most of my other dreams go. I wanted to remember my dream so that I could share it with my fellow grocers so that maybe one or two might turn my dream into a reality. I had a dream. In this dream I was with my children and my mother at a big river. My children were not being ideal children. They were not grateful to be at the river and they were not appreciative of the blessings that they had in life that day. My mother apologized for their poor attitudes – like it was her fault – and offered to take them home. I was upset, and I asked her to make them think about the good things they had in their life and to trace them back to where they came from.Those were the exact words in my dream. Trace it back. I really started to think about it and it struck me that to be truly appreciative of our good things, we need to trace them back to the origin. Do our blessings originate from luck? From hard work? By chance? It ...

by Adam Zack — January 16, 2019

The meeting is called “Feelings”

“I need you more than you need me.” Said the CEO of a nearly $100 million dollar company to the new hire. And the new hire was a courtesy clerk. A box person. And he meant it. Now I am sure you are thinking that this is some kind of crazy dream I had after a big meal of spicy Asian food. Or some kind of fabled story out of a motivational book that no one has ever actually seen done. Real life CEOs don’t say that to the new hires, right? Heck, CEOs rarely even come in contact with new hires at all. So many company leaders I have seen over the years champion “Our employees are our greatest asset!”, meanwhile their actions tell a different story. The bottom line is more important than any employee. Management bonuses take precedence over the associates that are toiling in the trenches.The “big picture” always excludes the “little guy.” It’s the norm in most businesses, and businesses have been very successful doing it that way for centuries. That is why I was awestruck as Norman Mayne, owner and CEO of Dorothy Lane Markets in Dayton, Ohio told me his philosophy on his employees. He explained that although they may need the job, they really don’t need him. They ca...

by Adam Zack — January 9, 2019

Food is entertainment!

The way a lot of people get their thrills has changed so much over the past decade. Make that several decades. I remember being a really little kid – maybe 7 years old – and played at my best friend Scott’s house every day after school. We’d played with Hot Wheels and made forts and tormented his bratty sister. One day we came across his dad’s stash of Playboy magazines. Holy guacamole! I’d never seen anything like that! They were interesting (not the articles) and exciting. When my mom and step-dad got married I was looking around for something one day and I came across one of his Playboy magazines. Oooh la la. Right there in the night stand. I just figured that all men liked the magazine for both the sweet honeys and the articles. I never gave it much more thought until last week when I heard someone talking about food porn. Man, I thought, I am definitely addicted to food porn. And I’m a very discerning, but quick to criticize food pornagrapher.A picture of butternut squash stuffing on a bed of lentils? Dog food. Looks terrible. Get the lighting right, and for God’s sake man, show me love! The money shot for great food makes you salivate for a taste. It makes you say “Oh man! That looks SO GOOD! It ma...

by Adam Zack — January 2, 2019

The smartest leaders surround themselves with the smartest people.

Some of the smartest guys I’ve ever met are the dumbest. I know that’s like an oxymoron. Or just a statement from a moron. I’ve known people who can solve complex mathematical problems that stagger my mind but couldn’t microwave a potato for dinner to save their lives. I’ve known brilliant lawyers with knowledge of the law that they can recite at will. These same people make terrible life and business choices that leave them marginally successful at best. I’ve seen computer programmers that can build a network that is amazingly efficient, but when asked to apply it to our industry just flail wildly, leaving everyone to wonder if they have any intelligence at all. I am convinced that the smartest leaders are indeed not the smartest people. The smartest leaders surround themselves with the smartest people. Leaders get the credit for the work of the smart people that he surrounds himself with.But hey! That’s unfair! The smart ones make things happen, right? And he gets all the credit. Unfair! I think it’s just the opposite. Smart leadership takes wisdom, and wisdom is making the right choices, learning from mistakes and having the instincts to achieve your go...

by Adam Zack — December 26, 2018

How great is it to get a real hug from your brother without any uncomfortableness?

The 70s and 80s were pretty much emotionless decades. Actually, all the preceding decades were too. I don’t mean that there were no emotions, I mean that they just didn’t get shared publicly like today. When we were growing up, guys greeted each other with a handshake, or maybe a high-five. Our dads didn’t say “I love you” every time we talked on the phone. They rarely said it at all. Man-hugs were pretty much non-existent. Brothers didn’t express any affection, especially publicly. We loved our friends, brothers, sisters and dads just as much then as now, too.Especially over this holiday period when I try and take a step back to take stock of all the things – and people – in my life that I love and am thankful for, I am especially thankful that it’s OK to show it and say it. How great is it to get a real hug from your brother without any uncomfortableness? To see male friends and be able to say I love you or I miss you without worrying that someone is thinking that you two are maybe a little more than “friends’? [Not that there’s anything wrong with that!] It’s especially tricky in today’s #metoo culture. Guys are just becomin...

by Adam Zack — December 19, 2018

Makin’ a list and checkin’ it twice
You can’t always get what you wantBut if you try sometime you findYou get what you need– Jagger/Richards, The Rolling Stones

Watch Video >Christmas time is loaded with lists. What gifts to get who. Who’s coming for dinner. What do you need to shop for. What’s the menu. Who to send cards to. Who not to send cards to. Who’s naughty. Who’s nice. As a kid we always made lists of what we wanted Santa (and a bit later, say 9 years old or so) or our parents to get us for Christmas. We started by looking at the Sears catalog in September. Marking pages, reading it over and over. Adding and subtracting to the list as fall marched towards Christmas. Not putting anything on the list that’s too far out of reach, but still with hopeful, lofty goals.Grandparents wanted to know what was on the list. And since I had three sets of grandparents, the list got fulfilled a bit more. It’s a very exciting time of year for list makers. Because I have great parents and family, the lists usually reached a pretty saturated state of cross-outedness. And since my birthday was a week...

by Adam Zack — December 11, 2018

The best retailers write their own music

Every summer near where I work in San Diego there is a Summer Concert Series that features cover bands. About 3,000 local residents attend and families old and young have a great time during the summer nights, eating picnic dinners, smuggling in wine and beer and dancing to the sounds of Michael Jackson, The Rolling Stones, Johnny Cash and other popular musicians. It’s a fun party and a real example of what American neighborhood camaraderie is like. And the cover bands are good, recreating faithful versions of some of your favorite tunes. The masses dance and you can get right up to the stage and if you’ve had enough wine and close your eyes (really tight, no peeking) you might imagine that you are front row for Elton John or The Beatles. The bands make a living and everyone has fun. But does any musician grow up with the goal of being the best Led Zeppelin cover band? Is being in a great cover band ever a goal, or is it just the result of a musical career that never amounted to a paying gig?For the cover band, imitation is not just a form of flattery, it’s a way to meet the demand for a supply that may be extinct. You’d never get to see the ac...

by Adam Zack — December 5, 2018

Son of Cheapass

As I’ve written before, pretty much everything we do revolves around money. How much did you save? What kind of deal can I get? That place is too expensive. There’s a big sale this Wednesday. Sales are up. Sales are down. I hate to think it. I hate to say it. But it’s true and no matter how much I wish I didn’t have to think about balancing budgets, being fair, spending or not spending and investing back, what to buy who and how much to spend for Christmas, it’s just a fact.One of my early memories about money was when I was about 10. We were with my biological father in San Francisco at a very nice restaurant called Scoma’s for lunch. There were 6 of us total, I think. When the bill came my dad was going to leave a $4 tip. Yes, four bucks. Mind you, this was about 44 years ago, but even then a $4 tip was cheapskate/insulting territory. I begged with to leave more and wondered if he didn’t, how I would be able to get out of the restaurant without being permanently branded as Son of Cheapass. I think he did leave more – grudgingly – but his reasoning that it’s the same service he’d get at Denny’s always stuck with me.Anytime I find myself even remotely leaning cheapass when it comes to tipping I remind myself “It’s only a...