Grand Opening: Tag Collects

Off the tails of the roaring success of our second show, we decided to continue down the path of enriching our community by extending our service-based business model to a brick-and-mortar card shop, something that was needed and welcomed in the Carrollton area. The ball was already rolling with our brand from the conventions, we had a vision, and failure was never an option. Enter our third partner, Tommy. He had been helping in the background on the convention side and was instrumental to a huge early deal we did together before the conventions even began. Once the brick-and-mortar shop became a goal, Kenny was rolling deep with his mechanic shop, I was engulfed to my neck in my construction company, there was a need for a day-to-day operations manager for the shop. Tommy, working hand in hand with Kenny, was able to find our location we are in now. Boom. Got the spot. But, as we learned from the first convention, finding the location was a very small win.

We got the keys for our location in August. We were supposed to have everything turned over in a nice, clean, presentable manner. We didn't feel like we expected too much. As a renter, a clean, shoppable space was to be expected. Well, that's not what we were given. We gave them 2 months to correct everything we needed corrected. After two months, almost none of the necessary improvements had been made. So here we sat. Two months into a lease with an unshoppable space. Certainly not what I had envisioned our shop to look like. At the end of the day, it was our brand we were building, and we refused to allow our brand to come off as unfinished, dirty, and not welcoming. So, we got to work.

The month of October became a blur. Working every day at my construction company and every night and weekend at the card shop. We upgraded the lighting, installed floors, did trim, painted, installed shelves, painted more, fixed plumbing, arranged the displays, removed old advertising, cleaned, cleaned, and cleaned again, the list goes on. while all of this was going on, the administrative side didn't stop either. Tommy was ordering materials, securing vendors, securing product, getting our sign together, creating partnerships. With us getting close to the finished space we had envisioned, we set a date. November 8th. That would be the grand opening. We could not contain our excitement.

9am, November 8th, I come out of the door of the shop to set up our wacky wavy tube guys. I am greeted to cheers. I look down the sidewalk and there was a line waiting on the doors to open. I was washed over with a sense of pride and amazement at the blessing before us. We had done it. After 3 months of having the keys, we had finally made it. Finally made it to the finish... I mean starting line. We were finally ready to rock. 

We have been open for one month at the time of me writing this and the outpouring from the community has been amazing yet again. We continue to grow week by week and that is thanks to the very people reading this. We thank you and we hope you understand that your support is the most important aspect of our business. Can't wait to see you soon and remember, when somebody asks, "How are you?", "blessed and unstoppable" is always a good response. Much love from the Tag Team!