An insider's hilarious, whirlwind account of his years spent globe-trotting in search of the holy grail of handbags: the Birkin
For more than twenty years, the Hermès Birkin bag has been the iconic symbol of fashion, luxury, and wealth. Though the bag is often seen dangling from the arms of celebrities, there is a fabled waiting list of more than two years to buy one from Hermès, and the average fashionista has a better chance of climbing Mount Everest in Prada pumps than of possessing one of these coveted carryalls. Unless, of course, she happens to know Michael Tonello . . .
Michael's newfound career started with an impulsive move to Barcelona, a vanished job assignment, no work visa, and an Hermès scarf sold on eBay to generate some quick cash. But soon the resourceful Michael discovered the truth about the waiting list and figured out the secret to getting Hermès to part with one of these precious bags. Millions of dollars worth of Birkins later, Michael had become one of eBay's most successful entrepreneurs—and a Robin Hood to thousands of desperate rich women.
With down-to-earth wit, Michael chronicles the unusual ventures that took him to nearly every continent, from eBay to Paris auction house and into the lives of celebrities and poseurs. Flirting with danger, Michael recounts the heady rush of hand delivering his first big score to famed songwriter Carole Bayer Sager in Paris; how he had to hire thugs to rescue a bag that one of his "shoppers" held for ransom; and the story of the Oscar-worthy performances that allowed him to snag "reserved" bags from other, less dogged Birkin seekers.
Whether he's relating his wining and dining, buying and selling, dodging and weaving, laughing and crying, or schmoozing and stammering, Michael is a master raconteur who weaves together tales of hunting Birkins in the world's most posh locales, memories of meals that would make any gastronome salivate, anecdotes of obsessed collectors with insatiable desires, and sweetly intimate stories about his family, friends, and finding true love. The result is a memoir that is distinctive, fun, page-turning, and as addictive as its namesake.
Oh sure, they say they're busy. They say that they didn't have even a moment in their insanely busy day to pick up the phone. It was just that crazy. All lies. With the advent of cell phones and speed dialing, it is almost impossible not to call you. Sometimes I call people from my pants pocket when I don't even mean to. If I were into you, you would be the bright spot in my horribly busy day. Which would be a day that I would never be too busy to call you.
She says:
There is something great about knowing that my only job is to be as happy as I can be about my life, and feel as good as I can about myself, and to lead as full and eventful a life as I can, so that it doesn't ever feel like I'm just waiting around for some guy to ask me out. And most importantly, it's good for us all to remember that we don't need to scheme and plot, or beg anyone to ask us out. We're fantastic.
For ages women have come together over coffee, cocktails, or late-night phone chats to analyze the puzzling behavior of men.
He's afraid to get hurt again. Maybe he doesn't want to ruin the friendship. Maybe he's intimidated by me. He just got out of a relationship.
Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo are here to say that -- despite good intentions -- you're wasting your time. Men are not complicated, although they'd like you to think they are. And there are no mixed messages.
The truth may be He's just not that into you.
Unfortunately guys are too terrified to ever directly tell a woman, "You're not the one." But their actions absolutely show how they feel.
He's Just Not That Into You -- based on a popular episode of Sex and the City -- educates otherwise smart women on how to tell when a guy just doesn't like them enough, so they can stop wasting time making excuses for a dead-end relationship.
Reexamining familiar scenarios and classic mindsets that keep us in unsatisfying relationships, Behrendt and Tuccillo's wise and wry understanding of the sexes spares women hours of waiting by the phone, obsessing over the details with sympathetic girlfriends, and hoping his mixed messages really mean "I'm in love with you and want to be with you."
He's Just Not That Into You is provocative, hilarious, and, above all, intoxicatingly liberating. It deserves a place on every woman's night table. It knows you're a beautiful, smart, funny woman who deserves better. The next time you feel the need to start "figuring him out," consider the glorious thought that maybe He's just not that into you. And then set yourself loose to go find the one who is.
Book Description: In this strategy-packed guide, top e-business consultant Scott Fox reveals the powerful but simple methods for striking it rich on the Net. Exclusive interviews with dozens of "mom and pop" entrepreneurs prove how easy it is to get started and build a million-dollar enterprise. Readers get:
An inspiring guide to e-business opportunities, including "instant e-businesses" that require no start-up capital or technical training * proven strategies for making money from home and turning hobbies into businesses * low cost web marketing and product tips * legal and financial advice * detailed vendor recommendations * years of expertise and experience in one easy-to-use book Internet Riches also offers an innovative action plan for brainstorming new business ideas, and fun exercises to help readers determine the best moves for their particular situations. Filled with practical pointers and motivational interviews, it's the most powerful guide ever to finding financial freedom online!
Q&A with Scott Fox, author of Internet Riches
A 2007 survey showed that nearly half of American workers aren't satisfied with their jobs. What do you feel is holding people back from going into business for themselves?
People give their hesitation lots of names but it basically boils down to fear. I wrote Internet Riches precisely to help people overcome these fears. Starting an e-business today is much easier, much cheaper, and requires much less technology expertise than most people realize.
Unfortunately fear of failure, fear of embarrassment, fear that the learning curve is too steep, fear that there will not be a payoff for their work, fear that they cannot afford to do it, fear that they won't be able to live up to their own expectations or the needs of the business combine to keep many people from even trying. It's sad but true that in an effort to be "rational", these fears often combine to create a self-image where a person can't imagine themselves building a successful e-business.
The problem is that this fear is based on an outdated 20th century understanding of the risks required to start your own business. As thousands of my readers have found, if you update your assumptions to reflect the realities of how easy it is to start your own business in the Internet Age, the conclusions change dramatically and in your favor.
The facts are plain: online markets are continuing to grow explosively, the costs of the equipment and infrastructure have dropped dramatically, the flexibility of working from home on a part-time basis means that people don't have to quit their full-time jobs to pursue online success, and the great upside available to people who own their own small businesses have all combined to completely change the risk/reward equation.
Based on your research and experience, what areas have the most potential for growth in the coming years?
I'd put these opportunities in 3 buckets: The first bucket is filled with the obvious growth opportunities such as international markets and the mobile web (By this I mean the evolution of e-commerce into mobile commerce on your handheld device). Continuing explosive growth in these markets offers major profit opportunities.
The second bucket is the mining of niche markets. Because the Internet lets people communicate more easily than was possible in the 20th century, we are seeing the rapid emergence of millions of micro communities based on niche interests. This means that almost any hobby or issue can be used as the basis for a community of like-minded individuals. And anywhere there is a community, there is a market for goods and services which solve the problems faced by that community. The Internet allows entrepreneurs greater ability to service these niche markets cost-effectively than ever was possible before the Internet.
The third area of opportunity is the hardest to quantify but the most explosive: This is where entrepreneurs find new and unexpected ways to exploit the efficiencies of the Web to create new products, services, and markets. When one of these ideas finds particular success, it can spread like wildfire across the web and create very profitable new businesses very quickly. The big success stories like Facebook are very well covered by the media but there are thousands of smaller, millionaire-making e-businesses emerging all the time.
The benefits of starting a niche company are many; work from home, mesh passions with profits, be your own boss, etc. However, what potential pitfalls do niche market businesses need to look out for?
Getting ahead of yourself is probably the most common trap that I see for entrepreneurs. Especially because so many "get rich quick" gurus promise unrealistic returns, entrepreneurs can get hurt by diving too deeply, too quickly into their new passion. So, although one of the best parts of starting a business is turning your own enthusiasm into a revenue generator, this enthusiasm can also blind you to possible flaws in your approach.
Three ways to reduce these risks are:
1. Do your research. This means thoroughly investigating the competition (both online and off), pricing the goods and services needed for operations, and setting a realistic budget up-front for both your money and your time. 2. Take advantage of the new e-business paradigm by keeping your costs down, especially at first. Try a few versions of your business model to learn what works the best. Wait until you have found the most profitable approaches before signing any long term contracts or investing heavily in a new venture. In other words, don't quit your day job until you have evidence that your new web site can lead to the pay-off you're targeting. 3. Manage your time, relationships, and expectations with extra care during the start-up period. It can be hard on your family and relationships if you are suddenly working two jobs at once. Just as with your financial budget, you should develop a time line for your projects. Discuss this plan, and its associated trade-offs, with your family to get them on board, too. These steps can help you keep your enthusiasm from overwhelming your good business sense. They can also help preserve your capital until it can be used most effectively.
You state that venture capital is no longer needed for today's internet start-up. Is this a product of cheaper technology, gun-shy investors, or both?
Venture capital can still be appropriate for capital-intensive ventures or to accelerate an already growing business. But for the niche entrepreneurs reading Internet Riches, it's rarely needed because all the competition among technology service providers has so significantly lowered the costs and risks of starting an online business.
This trend is driven by competition in the technology sector, not just on the prices of hardware but also on the costs and ease of use of software, plus the economies of scale enabled by the Internet's penetration into daily life and business operations worldwide.
For example, technologies that 10 years ago required tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars and an IT engineering team on staff are now available to small businesses in easier to use web-based versions for a small monthly fee. Server maintenance, software upgrades, and tech support are included. This used to be called Application Service Providers (ASPs) but the latest buzzword is SaaS (Software as a Service). Companies can also source goods with increasing efficiency, pricing transparency helps lower prices, and there are more people online shopping than ever before. These trends combine to lower costs, speed up time to market and increase the profit potential of any new e-business venture.
Cheaper, more efficient and easier-to-use technology has also greatly reduced the costs of infrastructure for setting up a new e-business. Now entrepreneurs can work from home, in their spare time, and not have to invest in office space, parking, furniture, insurance, signage, etc. etc. Most of those "real world" costs that were required to start a business in the 20th century have been eliminated for today's Internet entrepreneurs.
Technology advancements have also revolutionized advertising. Services like Google's Adsense/Adwords and Yahoo's Search Marketing Solutions allow any business to advertise cost-effectively to consumers worldwide from a desktop PC. At the same time, those services can make money for entrepreneurs because they will place paid advertising on even the smallest, newest of web sites for no up-front cost. This gives any niche entrepreneur access to a potential advertising revenue stream previously only available to companies that owned newspapers, TV stations or radio programs.
If a business is less expensive to run, its products are cheaper to deliver and faster to market, and its advertising budget is more cost-effective, then it will also need less capital to get started. The combination of all these increased efficiencies and lower costs means a LOT less risk for entrepreneurs, and therefore less need for venture capital to sustain the business until revenues get started. Entrepreneurs can instead focus on growing their businesses instead of on technology support or on raising money that they may not need. Sorry, venture capitalists!
How important is search engine optimization (SEO) to a budding business?
SEO is a key strategy for marketing success, both for online and `real world' businesses.
In my seminars, I often say "Search engines are the Yellow Pages of the 21st century." You wouldn't traditionally have started a business without listing your phone number in the phone book would you?
Online is increasingly where the consumers are, so your business needs to be there as highly ranked as possible to attract as much traffic as possible. Today you can pay for prominent listings, just like in the days of the Yellow Pages' dominance. But you can also get good search engine display "organically" for free. This means carefully crafting your web pages' appearance, copy, and keywords to attract a high ranking from Google and Yahoo.
Often overlooked is the increasing importance of search engines for "real world" businesses, too. If you have a real world business based on local marketing (like a chiropractor or dry cleaner) you may not need a constantly updated e-commerce web site. But you should put up a basic "brochure" web site that is optimized for search engines. As everyone spends more time connected to the Web, you'll want to be easily discoverable by your local customers online, too.
Internet Riches has three chapters about online marketing tactics for small business. These "No Budget Online Marketing Secrets," "Small Budget Online Marketing Secrets," and "Real Budget Online Marketing Secrets" chapters discuss "pull" marketing tactics like free organic search engine optimization, as well as "push" marketing techniques like keyword advertising and email newsletter publishing that can help any small business grow its online profitability.
Book Description:
"These days it’s easier, cheaper, and safer than ever to start an Internet business using readily available technology and turnkey opportunities. In this strategy-packed guide, Scott Fox reveals the powerful but simple methods he and thousands of others have used to strike it rich on the Net. Exclusive interviews with “mom and pop” entrepreneurs prove how easy it is to get started and build a million-dollar enterprise. Readers get:
* a guide to e-business opportunities, including “instant e-businesses” that require no start-up capital
* strategies for making money from home and turning hobbies into businesses
* marketing and product tips
* legal and financial advice
* a list of recommended vendors
* years of expertise and experience in one easy-to-use book
Internet Riches also features an action plan for brainstorming new business ideas, and exercises to help readers determine the best moves for their particular situations. Filled with practical pointers and inspiring interviews, it’s the most powerful book ever on starting and enjoying a million-dollar online business!"
Over one million people list an item for sale on eBay every day—and 600,000 of these are professional full-time sellers. Now anyone with ambition and a dream can realize financial success on eBay. Whether readers are looking to be their own boss or launch a part-time business, eBay guru Skip McGrath walks them through a series of easy steps designed to generate income in less than a month. This practical guide reveals how to find products to sell, successfully compete in the crowded eBay marketplace, and optimize and grow one’s business. Three Weeks to eBay Profits offers instant answers to anyone who dreams of running this or her own business and realizing financial freedom.
Skip McGrath is currently a Gold Level Power Seller on eBay. He has written seven books on eBay selling, including The eBay Power Seller’s Manual and The Complete eBay Marketing System. His Web site, www.auction-sellers-resource.com, is one of the most visited eBay-related sites on the Net.
Product Description: Thinking about buying or selling items on eBay? Whether you want to use eBay to make smart bids and win auctions or turn household clutter into cash, eBay for Dummies, Fifth Edition is your passport to the most successful trading community on the planet. Beginning with an overview of what eBay is and how to become a registered user, eBay for Dummies helps you discover how you can:
Search for items to buy and list items to sell on eBay
Place a bid—and determine how much you should spend
Use pictures and basic HTML to make your eBay listings more appealing
Communicate well and close deals without a problem
Organize your transactions and interactions using the My eBay page
Resolve buying and selling issues with eBay’s Trust & Safety program
And much more!
Registering at eBay makes you part of a really unique community of people who like to collect, buy, and sell items of just about every kind! So if you’re ready to join the millions of people who use their home computers to make great deals, buy cool stuff, and turn a profit, eBay for Dummies does all the legwork so you can sit back and let the bidding begin!
Product Description: Entrepreneurs in record numbers are setting up shop on eBay, according to a new survey conducted for eBay by ACNielsen Media Research International. More than 724,000 Americans report that eBay is their primary or secondary source of income. In addition to these professional eBay sellers, another 1.5 million individuals say they supplement their income by selling on eBay, according to the July 2005 survey. In the last six months of 2005, eBay members in the United States sold merchandise worth approximately $10.6 billion. As you can see, finding the customers is not a problem locating quality items to sell, is the challenge. So what do you do when you are done cleaning out your closet and attics? Where do you find the merchandise you need to sell on eBay? That s precisely what this new book is about: where to find products that you can buy for a few cents on the dollar and resell for massive profits! This book is intended for online sellers who want to build a business that can be increased over time by selling primarily new merchandise in quantity. You will be provided detailed insider information on: wholesalers, drop shippers, auctions, closeouts, discontinued merchandise, overstocks, salvage items, surplus merchandise, below wholesale products, customer returns, wholesale trade shows, suppliers, liquidators, close out firms, foreign and domestic manufacturers, and places to look in your area. In short you will learn to become a product sourcing pro and make money on eBay with products including: clothing, mixed lots, electronics, tools, furniture, general mixed merchandise, domestics, housewares, antiques, books, shoes, jewelry, toys, gifts, sporting goods, hardware, and much more.
Product Description: eBay is the world’s marketplace! If you’re ready to turn your hobby into an online business, Marsha Collier knows exactly how to help. Packed with proven techniques for boosting your business, Starting an eBay Business For Dummies, 3rd Edition includes the steps to success that you’ll want to know.
More than a million people are earning regular income on eBay. Those who are earning the most know how to set up a business, find and manage inventory, use auction management software to best advantage, get freebies on shipping, and run their businesses professionally. Marsha Collier was one of the first, and she shares all the secrets she’s learned. In this fun and easy guide to getting your online business off and running, you’ll discover how to:
Attract more bidders to your auctions
Set up a professional business
Find out what sells and what doesn’t
Increase bidder confidence with strong listings
Price your items to sell
Reduce your costs by shipping more efficiently
Work with a PayPal account and collect your money
Understand legal issues such as taxes and licenses
Keep appropriate records
Improve your image with outstanding customer service
Marsha Collier has been so successful with her home-based business that she educated her daughter on the profits and today is one of the stars of the eBay community. Along with plenty of solid information and time-and-money-saving tips, she’ll give you the confidence you need to become an eBay entrepreneur.
Product Description: Want to discover the most profitable, lowest-risk idea for your home business? It's selling used books online, which is growing 33 percent annually, according to a new study by U.S. publishers. Learn how to start your business part-time, then expand at your own pace. This step-by-step guide, written by one of the most successful and highly rated sellers on Amazon and eBay, includes everything you need to know:
Eleven minibooks comprising nearly 800 pages offer would-be online entrepreneurs all the information they need to launch an e-business and succeed in today's marketplace
Unlike competing guides, this book explains how to redesign a site, retool marketing strategies, and run a nonprofit site as well as offering in-depth coverage of how to secure a site and move from retail to e-tail
Minibooks cover online business basics, legal and accounting matters, Web site design, operational issues once a business is up and running, Internet security, how to boost sales, taking a brick-and-mortar business online, storefront selling at eBay and elsewhere, fundraising at a nonprofit site, running a niche e-business, and advanced e-commerce techniques and strategies
With any business, it is up to the individual owner of said business to ensure the success of the business. You may make more or less than any sample figures or results that might be quoted on our web sites or other publications. All business involves risk, and many businesses do not succeed. Further, Answers 2000 Limited does NOT represent that any particular individual or business is typical, or that any results or experiences achieved by any particular individual/business is necessarily typical.
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