Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Magic Cards and Jesus

Most of us go through life not really thinking much.  It's easy to be on autopilot to get most of your tasks done each day.  Most of us don't mean to hurt others and the self-absorbed, self-serving acts are not malicious.  On Monday this week someone took two sealed boxes of Magic the Gathering cards.  I don't suspect that the person who took them (or, even anyone who knows them) will probably read this blog or even care. 

Something happened to the world.  A very important lesson has been missed by a lot of people.  I don't care where you stand on religion or faith, but underlying everything the bible says is the Golden Rule: "Do unto others as you would have done to you."  I think even stupid people understand the meaning.

When you own a small (or in my case, a micro-) business, pretty much everybody else gets paid first.  For 16+ years, I've made a lot of people a lot of money.  I'm NOT one of them.  My employees get paid okay money; not great.  Inventory, utilities, rent, and insurance come next.  Then, sometime, I get paid.  I don't get a bonus when I lose money.  Hell, I don't get a bonus when I MAKE money.  Don't get me wrong, I love this business and the store's actually doing better than it has in a long, long time.  In fact, within the next few weeks we'll be expanding the hours and adding a few new faces.

If you're the asshole who needed the Magic cards so bad that you waited 'til Tim had his back turned, here's how you've affected ME:  The money I've lost from those two boxes would have been an entire week's pay for a part time employee.  Due to YOUR action (and others like you), I can't trust ANYONE who buys Magic.  I will now have to completely rearrange our way of selling Magic.  I will have to WASTE at least $1600 to install a security system; that, by the way, is TEN WEEKS pay for a part time employee.  Happy time for you though, you got free Magic from THE ONLY place in the area that has reasonably priced singles and FREE Friday Night Magic.  Do me a favor, brag about how stupid we are.  To as many people as possible.  Everybody else?  Pay attention.  Find these jerks.  If you give me information that leads to prosecution of these people, you will stop a bleeding of money that could have let someone else pay their bills and shouldn't have happened in the first place.  Oh, and, the reward for doing the "right thing" will be better than what the jerks walked off with, I promise.  These people steal from me, other stores, and (probably) you, too.

Sorry, no love this week-
Brian