How to Bring the FUN Into Growing Your Business

In 1959, when I was 27 years old, I created my first FUN business. It was called “The Blue Banjo”, and we were located in “The Skid Road” section of Seattle, Washington. This establishment had at its very core the element of “FUN”:  FUN for me as creator, FUN for employees, and FUN for the customers. We played music so that everyone could sing along with the band or at least, stomp their feet to the rhythm. We would play, “I’ve Been Working On The Railroad”, at least 3 times an evening. We also made an effort to seat customers with other customers they didn’t know. We found that this created a synergy for additional FUN as the evening progressed. By 1961, The Blue Banjo had the reputation as the most FUN place to visit in all of Seattle. I discovered at the time that the more fun the customers were having, the less they were concerned about how much they were paying for the tab. Our customers were having so much fun that they did not even notice when we raised prices. My focus was always on how we could make this even more fun. So we began brainstorming ideas. Some of the following ideas are just a few of those we implemented to make the experience a fun one. Fred, our “Greeter and Seater” fellow, was selling garters along with our .25 cent popcorn basket. These originals were made by my mother and sold for $1.25, a high price for garters in 1961. Fred stuck a piece of white cardboard in the band of his straw hat (we all wore straw hats) with 10 garters on it and a sign at the top with the price. To make it even more fun, whenever a guy purchased a garter for his lady, Fred would blow a whistle and yell out, “Garter Sale”. In most cases, the band was between numbers, so he would have the lady stand up on her chair, or on the top of the bar, and then Fred would install the garter with a drum roll and a slide whistle from the band. We eventually were selling 75 garters each night. Our tuba player, Elroy, taped bright colored silk tulips all around the opening of his upright tuba, and once or twice each evening, I would make a ritual of going over and pouring beer from a pitcher all over the tulips and into his instrument. Another fun thing was that we installed an “auga” horn used on submarines so that every time we planed “Anchors Away”.  We would set the horn off and yell, “Dive! Dive”! Whenever the band, made up of 3 banjos, tuba, piano and myself on drums, took a break every 45 minutes, I would pull down this old window shade where I had printed the words, “Kidney Break” with a picture of a huge red kidney bean.  Hopefully, you are beginning to get the idea. With every FUN idea integrated into the fabric of our business, we could charge more with no worry of losing customers. By the time we were open one year, we were the only tavern in town with a cover charge to get in while still having lines of customers.   In 1965, we opened our first Farrell’s Ice Cream Parlour Restaurant in Bellevue, Washington, the second of 136 stores nationwide. This was the start of a territorial franchise for my partner Joe and me, and a natural fit for us.  The element of creating FUN in business had, by this time, become second nature to us, and the foundation of the Farrell’s concept. In fact, “FUN” became such a trademark of this business that the employees, on their own initiative, had buttons printed up with the words, “It’s FUN to work at Farrell’s”. Now when was the last time you heard of any business having its employees do such a thing! We had 36 employees at the time, and our costs for hiring a new employee were automatically reduced by this simple button because most of the young people around wanted to work in a “FUN” place. I remember the day I suggested that we charge $1.00 for a banana split. At the time, we were selling the item for .75 cents, already the highest price for a banana split in our geographical area. We ended up selling more at $1.00 than we ever did at .75 cents/each. Again, no one seemed to notice because the customers were having as much FUN as our employees.  On your birthday, all the employees would gather around, sing Happy Birthday, and bring a FREE sundae with a candle in it.  Within a few years, we and the customers were celebrating, in four different locations, some 60,000 birthdays every year with a sizeable portion of FUN. That is, with an average of six customers per birthday party, over 360,000 people, and a lot of customers for ice cream! Another “event” was when someone would order the “ZOO”, one of the employees would come out playing a bass drum, and others would be carrying the “ZOO” on a stretcher. Now the “ZOO” had enough ice cream, toppings and whipping cream to feed at least 10 people. Many people would come in just to see the show when either they or someone else would order this item. The “PIG TROUGH” was another humongous item serving several customers where all the staff would oink in unison while it was being delivered. After four years in this business, we decided to give out a questionnaire to see just what our customers thought of us. At the time, during the months of August, November, and December, at the largest regional shopping center near Seattle, we were serving over 3,000 people our hamburgers and ice cream every day. After only one week, we ended the survey with more than 5,000 responses. On almost every single page, there was the word “FUN”.   It was a huge confirmation of our hunch…that we were not selling food or ice cream, we were selling FUN! That’s when I had a gigantic banner installed on our office wall to remind us every day what this business was really all about.  It read, “This company sells FUN!” The main question I find with entrepreneurs that I meet is this, “Can you integrate…really…the element of FUN into any business”? I mean, there are financial planners, garbage collectors, accountants, any number of jobs that we normally do not think of as FUN. Nevertheless, my answer is a resounding “YES!” If your employees, and you, are having FUN, the stage is set for your customers to automatically have FUN. This starts with the giving of recognition to each of your workers, acknowledging them for their individual energies, ideas, skills and abilities. This has nothing to do with more salary or raises. In fact, in all the major employee surveys done in the market place, an increase in salary or a raise is usually around #10 on the list of what keeps people showing up for work every day.   One of the items at the top of the list is allowing employees to come up with more FUN ways to accomplish their work in an atmosphere of creativity and collaboration vs. competition. As a business owner, the responsibility for creating this atmosphere and getting the ball rolling lies with you. Once you do, your employees will automatically follow suit. Allowing them to make decisions on the lowest possible level will also contribute to their experience of being valued and important, and it is always more FUN to come to work when you feel valued and important. Encouraging and allowing employees to set their own sales and work goals is probably the number one most important idea you can build into the foundation of your business. It has worked every time I have used it and without exception, the employees’ expectations and goals far exceeded my own. In addition, the end results also exceeded those set by me. There are 1000’s of ideas that can be implemented to transform any business into a FUN business. Ideas that as yet have not been thought of.  Back in 1991, I began a painting contracting business with the logo,  “We Love to Paint!” To this day, some 17 years later, if any employee doesn’t have FUN painting, they don’t work with the company. It would be well worth the time, however long, to brainstorm on this most important question: “How do I make my business so much FUN that my employees...and customers, can’t wait for Monday morning?”  My professional advice is to spend money on this one.  I assure you, it will come back to you 10 times over…at least. 2008-04-04T02:20:54Z

2008-04-06T18:09:41Z

-24.2573

1442 607

true

8154

how-to-bring-the-fun-into-growing-your-business

2008-04-06T18:09:37Z

How do I make my business so much FUN that my employees and customers, can't wait for Monday morning?

How to Bring the FUN Into Growing Your Business

2009-02-24T09:43:40Z