Steaks on Sale

The new steaks from O Ottomanelli & Sons are truly wonderful.  As part of our effort to get people to try them out, we have a limited time Buy 1 Get 1 Free steak program for the Ribeyes and Strip steaks.  Try one out and then let us know what you think.

Singin' In the Rain

Nasty rainy days make my life miserable, just like everyone else.  The chances of catching a cab are about as good as winning the lottery.  The winds whip around in manhattan making mincemeat of any umbrella that you might try to use.  And, if you do manage to keep the umbrella in one piece, the cab that wouldn't pick you up drives by and splashes a puddle all over you.

But, as a business owner of a service that is just a lifesaver in the rain, I also LOVE the rain.  Nothing showcases the ultra convenience of our service better than ordering a movie, some popcorn, snacks and drinks during a thunderstorm.  When the MaxDelivery guy comes about 40 minutes later, it makes you feel just how great our service is and how much easier it makes your life.  The only tough part of these days is getting enough people to cover all the extra orders.

And, for those who have asked, our staff gets topline Colombia Outdoor rain gear to keep them dry (though on hot summer rainstorms, they may prefer to get wet to cool off) and we take it a little slower during the storms for safety.

So, the next time it is pouring outside, you can probably put the blame squarely on me and those rain dances/voodoo rituals that I have been performing to coax the thunderstorms to come...

The Fun Life of Small Businesses

I was reading an article today about one of our Best of New York partners, Jacques Torres Chocolates.  We've been working with Jacques for a long time and think the world of their chocolates - high end, gourmet chocolates, made right here in NYC.

The gist of this article is that Jacques was being sued by Hershey's because his "Champagne Kiss" truffles were some kind of infringment on "Hershey's Kisses"  First, as you can see below, the Champagne Kiss looks NOTHING like a hershey's kiss.
     

Second, for anyone who has tasted the 2 of these chocolates, there would never be any confusion between the smooth silky flavor of Jacques chocolates and the .... (to be polite) somewhat less impressive taste of a Hershey's kiss.  Jacques would not be interested in copying their name and associating himself with chocolate that is, most would agree, inferior in quality and taste.

Just another day as a small business person trying to make a superior product and satisfy your customers.  You have to deal constantly with these small nuisances which have nothing to do with making your customers happy.

Eileens is back in stock!

We've got Eileen's Cheesecakes back in stock.

We're expanding the selection of the personal sized cheesecakes to all of their flavors. The only thing wrong with them is that they are killing my ability to watch my weight. The popularity of the cheesecakes has been amazing, so apparently I am not the only one having my waistline ruined by Eileen.

**Also, look for a new announcement coming soon about a fun new program by MaxDelivery. I'm tired of all the gloom and doom in the world these days and, while I can't actually make the problems in the Gulf better, we're going to try to bring some smiles to people over the next few months.

First Entry

People have suggested that we start a blog to muse over the vagaries of our unique service, along with announcing new and interesting things going on at www.maxdelivery.com. I'll try to keep the commercialization aspect of the posting to a minimum and focus more on events and happenings in running a small and fairly unique business, but I'll spend a few minutes here going over what the company is (for those 98% of you who have never heard of us).

What is MaxDelivery?
MaxDelivery is an online store that has everything you need, delivered to your door in under an hour. At its heart, it's a simple proposition - save people from running to 3-4 local stores to pick up groceries, wine, drugstore items, etc and let them get some of their life back. Do it all for them in less time than it would take to do it themselves - less than an hour for all deliveries. On top of that, we are able to do it at prices competitive with the supermarket and with a low delivery fee ($2.95). So, in my opinion (and those of our customers), we are the best thing since sliced bread (and yes, we carry sliced bread and fresh-baked loafs too!)

Who am I?
My name is Chris Siragusa, the founder of the company. I started this business about 5 years ago in an attempt to create a service that I personally found more convenient than going to the local deli. No offense meant to the next-day supermarket services, but scheduling my grocery delivery for 2 hour windows 2 days from now just never seemed convenient to me - it was more like scheduling the cable-guy for service. I've built the service with the express goal of being able to live my entire life without having to set foot in a supermarket again (haven't had to go to one in about 3 years now!) and with enabling my ability to be lazy while avoiding take out food every night.

What will this blog be about?
Now that the basic marketing spin has been done, this blog will mostly focus on the day to day issues that come up with a service such as ours. I expect there will be some amusing anecdotes about ordering that we get periodically, some discussions about new products and things we are adding, and some discussions about running a small business in New York. Hopefully, there will be some feedback and comments to make this a little bit of a 2 way street, but we'll see how that goes if we can get some entertaining content going.

Welcome to the blog and thanks for reading.