I’m not sure that any company functions on auto-pilot or cruise control although every entrepreneur optimistically dreams of it. A business with no turbulences would be boring anyways, true? Some days I’d agree to this. As of recent, I long for it.

Here’s why.

1) Cotton prices are at a 150 year high. A year ago cotton was $.77/lb. Compare that to the current price of $2.44/lb and you can see why this is a thorn in our side. An increase like this demands prices to be raised on our product. Something a new company doesn’t ever look forward to. The bad news is many experts don’t see any relief in the short term.

2) Gas prices. Our t-shirt pipeline from Mali to Omaha isn’t quite finished so until then, we will use big boxes and a boat. Boats take gas and you understand where this is going…….

3) Civil unrest in Africa. We were using a company out of the Ivory Coast to make our fabric. The country is not stable right now after recent elections and so our fabric provider is no longer an option. Our contingency plan? We planned on using a company out of Nigeria. Bad news again. Recent elections have disallowed this.

T-shirts aren’t hard to make………if you have fabric. So, we’re back to the drawing board trying to work up a solution or two…………..