January Numbers

Sales were tracking LY pretty nicely until the bottom fell out this week. In fact, it was the kind of week that makes me wonder if something is broken. Nothing is, as far as I can tell. 

Historically, January is a strong month for Switchables, but (as I explained last week) the most popular designs aren't there this year and I can't even get fixtures. That explains a couple hundred bucks. As for the rest...who knows? Having some new items might help, but I can't buy anything until I scrape together the money to pay my CPA and the Commonwealth. I did squirrel away my CPA's fee this week, although I'm not confident enough to spend it yet.
  
January and Year-to-Date

Total income: -30.0%
Total COGS: -24.5%
Payroll: -6.6%

Marketing: +59.7%
Net Income (Profit): -443% (-$909)

This is not the post that I thought I'd be writing at the beginning of the week. There's no good news buried in there; this was the worst January since 2007. Excel says that the top line is "only" down by $838 -- $793 of that from this week alone -- while Quickbooks insists that it's really $1,160. Don't ask me to explain the $300 discrepancy. Either way, I'm starting the year deep in the toilet.

February's target doesn't look too daunting. Next week's expected influx of new Switchables designs might be a small shot in the arm. The best I can hope for, though, is to chip away at January's shortfall.   

Well, it's not like I can do anything about it. Working harder makes no difference and there's obviously no room to advertise more, so there's only one logical response: Escape. I'm working up an interesting statistical post for next week, if you're the sort who can parse "interesting" and "statistics" together. After that I promise to leave numbers alone until the February report. They're just depressing anyway.