Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Our First Week Working A New "Gig" - Kiosk In A Mall

Port Charlotte, FL (82 degrees, clear blue skies)

 
We have worked for one week now at a kiosk in a mall.  It's located in a very nice Simon Mall in Port Charlotte Florida.  This is new type of job for us and it will last for two months until just after Christmas. 
 
Slippers and fleece blankets
 
 
We are selling sport memorabilia of all types.  Our location is right next to Starbucks and the food court.  Perfect!  The company we work for is called Slippermania and the owner hires fulltimers for 26 locations all over Florida.  He advertises in Workamper.com but we heard about him through fellow workampers at Indy KOA. 
 
Santa Hats
 
 
Wreaths
Four guys with the company arrived the night before and set up the booth for us.  All the merchandise was arranged by them and when we arrived to was ready to rock.  Well sort of...the mall supervisor had us move the booth slightly and it took a couple of days to get the fax and phone line hooked up. 
 
 
Most of the merchandise is football (pro and college) and basketball.  We keep track of what we sell and this is faxed to the warehouse at the end of the day.  New merchandise arrives every few days. 
 
 
Gnomes
 
 
 
 
I've struggled a little learning all the team logos.  However,  it has been much easier for John and he  is really good at helping the customers find their teams.  I added a app to my IPAD that tells us the scores and stats for the teams.  Our best sellers are the Steelers, Patriots, Yankees, Ravens, and Ohio State.  Interesting!
 
 Monkeys
 
 
We have not worked retail in the past but its a quick learning curve.  The customers are fun to serve and they get so excited when they find their favorite team. Plus, they sure don't seem to blink at the prices although the items are reasonable and good quality. 
 
"Big Footed" Santas
 
Christmas Ornaments
 
The owner originally started with sport slippers and has expanded with more items each year.  We work every day until just after Christmas. However, we can hire staff to fill in for us.  During the 23 hour marathon of Black Friday and Thanksgiving weekend we'll probably arrange that if possible. Our friends JC and Bev are helping us during the week of Christmas. 
 
Everybody love Mickey


We've enjoyed it and are making friends with some of the mall staff.  The hours are long and my only  complaint is my feet hurt from standing on concrete floors.  John found a good deal on a stool that we added to the booth today.  Our goal is to pay off our new tires for the motorcoach and have some extra spending money for diesel this winter.  We will be playing in Florida with our friends JC and Bev for three months after the booth closes down. 
 
We found a campground four miles from the mall called Harbor Lake RV Resort.  It's an Encore park and very nice.  The streets are wide and there is a nice pool and activities.It is a mixture of RV sites and park models. 

Our site

 
 
Park Model
 
 
This little guy came up to greet us after we first arrived.  My friend Gaye says the wood storks remind her of little old men.  :)
 
The beach is about ten minutes away.  We won't be seeing much of it for awhile except on Sunday when the mall hours are shorter.  However, we did go out the first day we arrived and checked out the beach near Venice. It was really rough and windy that day with some after affects Hurricane Sandy. We sure do love the ocean...don't you? 
 
 
 
I think we are going to like it here.  Stay tuned. 
 
 
 


Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Visit With Friends In Beautiful Tampa

Seffner, FL (62 degrees, blue skies, windy)

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I love palm trees!  It just made my heart sing as we started seeing more and more of them.  The weather has been windy & chilly due to the hurricane weather changes, but the sky is blue.  Life is good and we are far away from Sandy’s destruction.
 
We stayed at Lazy Days Campground in Seffner for three nights.  It’s expensive but the location worked well for us.  We wanted to see Karen and Al.  They are blogging friends (be sure to check out their blog especially if you like to kayak) that we met up with two years ago just after they sold their “sticks and bricks” in Georgia.  We got together  twice and it was fun to catch up with each others adventures.  Our friendship quickly took off again.  It was just like we’d seen them yesterday.  Al had just had sinus surgery and we were grateful he still felt like getting together. 
 
We did some shopping at the Camping World at Lazy Days and found a few cool items on sale.  I especially liked the light weight micro flannel blankets.  It will replace our down comforter.  We tried it last night and it works perfectly. 
 
We also met up with our friends Jean and Dick.  Jean and I used to work together at a hospital in Indianapolis.  She recently retired and has moved to Tampa to be with Dick.  Jean cooked us  a delicious brunch at their lovely home.  We had not met Dick before but instantly liked him.  We are so happy for them and glad they are so happy together.
 
 
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We checked out the MacDill Air Force base.  It’s one of our favorite military campgrounds.  It looked great and is starting to fill up for the winter.  The beach side restaurant had a live band and it was fun to sit out and enjoy the sunset. 
 
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We are now on our way to Port Charlotte for two months.  We’ll be working as my brother calls as  “one of those annoying kiosk people”. Smile
 
It’s with the company Slippermania and we’ll be selling sport memorabilia at the shopping mall.  The items are great for stocking stuffer  This is a new type of “gig” for us.  Check back soon for more details.