September

My blog post below announcing that Maria is now working on DCUM fulltime elicited a number of questions about expanding DCUM. In addition, a number of good suggestions for ways to enhance DCUM were offered. The comments got me thinking about our approach to growing and developing the website. I realized that while I have had what you might call a "philosophy" concerning how to address growth, I couldn't articulate it very well. Then, I stumbled across an article on a completely unrelated topic that encapsulated my ideas wonderfully.

Before I reveal what we might call the DCUM Credo, let me explain its origins. Some years ago, Maria and I met with an investor who was considering taking DCUM national. In turn, he referred us to a business specialist to help flesh out the business side of the operation. That specialist discussed the strengths of DCUM, the first and foremost of which he called "authenticity". We weren't a "build it and they will come" operation started by a deep-pocketed corporation. To the contrary, we were literally a "mom and pop" outfit being run on a shoestring. We did no advertising, growing purely organically. The investor ultimately lost interest in us, but the importance of "authenticity" to DCUM stuck with me.