Businessless

Maria Mart

Businessless

This book is dedicated to my dad, my mum, and my dearest friend, J.

Prologue.

How we met

It was a chilly November day almost five and a half years ago when Li and I first crossed paths. She had come to the shop for her initial interview, just as our previous business assistant was preparing to leave. My father, the firm’s director at the time, had arranged for a hiring agency to send a few candidates our way. Nestled in central London, our office enjoyed an enviable spot, flanked by Baker and Marylebone streets, right at the heart of all the hustle and charm. Or, come to think of it, maybe this is a long shot – the heart of London, as many would confidently say, is somewhere else, but liver or kidneys area look like an adequate reference as far as London’s breathing organism is concerned.

As soon as Li walked through the door, there was an inexplicable sense that this was the beginning of something enduring – a friendship that somehow felt older than that single moment. Li, you once told me you had the strange feeling we already knew each other back then. And I felt it too, as though our connection had been waiting patiently to be rediscovered that day.

I remember it as vividly as if it were yesterday. It wasn’t just the beginning of a friendship; it was also the day my coffee preferences changed forever – a shared love for caffeine that would play its own essential role in our story. But, perhaps more importantly, it was the day we quietly agreed to turn every work-related twist, every ‘tricky’ moment, into something we could laugh about.

And the reality is, anyone can relate to this: there are those rare days when you feel like quitting, and there are days when you finally realise – it is entirely your choice how to respond to any challenges which you are facing at the present.

I was sitting upstairs at the reception desk, a little nervous myself, even though I was not technically involved in an interview. My father introduced us warmly.

– It’s very nice to meet you, – I said, extending my hand. – Would you like some tea or coffee?”

– Yes, coffee would be great, – she replied with an easy smile.

– Would you like some milk with that?

– Oh, no, – Li said, shaking her head with just a hint of determination. – Just black americano, please.

And that was like a bolt of lightning for me. Why did I assume back then that a young woman like me (I was 24 then) would only go for some fancy, extra shot, oat or almond milk based, and hazelnut sugar-free syrup latte? I couldn’t picture drinking a cup of strong-roast black coffee.

I somehow managed to create a parallel between my mixed views on certain things in life, and coffee: just like my never changing love for a full of ‘unnecessary sugar-boost calories’ latte, my perception on other things didn’t always have any alternatives.

So, you can imagine the extent of my internal disagreement when Li said “no” to a milky coffee.

You see that coffee has taken on a symbolic weight for us in the retail world. It’s not just a drink anymore – it’s almost a code, a language that speaks to the kind of day you are having or the person you are dealing with. A drink that also mirrored our no-nonsense attitude: sometimes direct and without the need for sweeteners. Cup of strong americano, no sugar, naturally would recreate in your mind a person with a bold, opinionated character. We both shared a view that there was no need to coat words in a syrup, so a strong americano suited us perfectly. It has become a way to make sense out of the occasional chaos around us.

It had become a bonding ceremony for Li and I to enjoy a strong cup of americano every Monday morning (and through the week of course). Over that first sip, we would recount the weekend’s events, like two old friends catching up after years apart. Naturally, the coffee fuelled our discussions about work too – from trivial matters to the pressing topics of the day. It is fair to say that this book might not even exist if it weren’t for our mutual passion for those steaming cups of coffee. So, to stay true to that, I’ve decided to keep the format of this book much like our Monday chats – a dialogue between friends and colleagues.

It will be important to say here that in my eyes the nature of our job was never challenging or tough. The stress level during our eight-hour shifts was always so low (with a few notable exceptions) whereas I was involved in a little bit of everything: from serving customers to dealing with the shop stock supplies and working on various marketing materials and their reprint. The reason why I was allowed to participate in all sorts of tasks when the company was just found, is because initially this ‘family business’ had my father as a sole director. I joined in straight after receiving a Bachelor degree; then I was helping part-time to boost the company’s presence with all my fresh knowledge of marketing and digital campaigning. Li had a Business assistant role, and similarly she was doing all there was to do in the shop.

This book is not meant to portray our job as dreadful or make it seem like there’s a reason to complain about it. Quite the opposite: we have chosen to approach our experiences with a light-hearted touch, finding humour in moments that could easily be seen otherwise. Where a simple smile wasn’t enough, we paired the absurdity with a hint of sadness, knowing that sometimes laughter is the only way through. Every scenario you read here, every situation I describe, shaped me in subtle yet profound ways.

Perhaps this short book will help you spot new opportunities in unexpected places, just as it did for me. The next time you find yourself questioning whether you are truly where you want to be, or if you’re doing what makes you happy, flip through a random page of this book. Take a quick moment to smile, but don’t lose yourself in overthinking. During my years with the company that will soon unfold in these pages, there was little time for too much introspection. And that’s okay.

So whether you’re reading this on a quiet train ride, or while sprawled out on your couch, I hope it brings a soft chuckle, or maybe even a full-bellied laugh.

Chapter 1. Acquaintance

A crisp autumn morning in London. I’m rushing to make it to the office on time – no small feat considering my hour-and-half commute from Berkshire.

Navigating the twists and turns off Edgware Road, I slip onto Harcourt Street, thoughts circling around a single refrain: coffee, coffee, coffee. I could easily enjoy a cup at home, but knowing there is a twenty-to-thirty-minute window of pure, uninterrupted dark roast indulgence waiting for me at the shop, I resist the urge.

Oh, right. I should mention – I work at one of London’s little family-run food boutiques, a place known for selling the finest Italian truffles from Umbria. One of those exquisite delicacies you could absolutely live without – though saying that aloud might undermine my commitment to excellence. Perhaps the line should go something like: You can live without truffles, but why would you? I will workshop it later.

‘Honestly, if I’m ten minutes late, it’s not as if a line of impatient customers will be waiting at the door’, I muse, soothing myself into a slight detour to Marks & Spencer* for a bag of cheese twists.

*Marks and Spencer is a major British multinational retailer.

Our midday treat – a quiet ritual shared with a cup of coffee after lunch.

In a way, it has become an unspoken pact: we never plan who is bringing what, yet somehow, each of us just knows when it’s our turn to fetch the snacks.

Bag of twists in hand, I carry on toward Crawford Street, our little oasis. Here, the flow of people passing by, and the hum of taxis and cyclists strike a delicate balance. It’s neither as crowded as nearby Baker Street nor as serene as, say… well, I’m not entirely sure there are any quiet corners in London. Maybe that’s why I keep coming back.

I find a certain thrill in these busy mornings. There is something satisfying about being the first one to step into the shop and mark the start of our day by lifting the blinds, letting the early light spill across the main floor. The space fills with that soft, tentative sunlight, casting long beams that touch every corner, and I make a dash to silence the door alarm – though by then, it’s likely already ruffled the neighbours.

Normally, of course, this ritual falls to my colleague Li, who’s nearly always here before me. I’m speaking of those rare mornings when, by some twist of fate, I arrive before she does.

And then, of course, there’s the scent – a light veil of truffles, earthy and aromatic, wrapping the entire shop. Over time, the fragrance has grown on me, becoming as much a part of my daily rhythm as the coffee. Now, that scent feels familiar, almost comforting, like a touch of home. For many, ‘home’ has a distinct aroma – warm bread, fresh linens, maybe lavender – but for us, it’s truffles, grounding and rich. In some strange way, it’s the smell that connects us to this place.

Our shop isn’t large – just the ground floor, a bright space with three small tables for our customers and a reception area, where display shelves are stocked with samples.

Downstairs, the basement holds a spacious office where all the storing, packing, and shipping happen. Between these two spaces, divided by a staircase, lies our so-called ‘meeting room’. Amusingly, this ‘meeting room’ has only seen actual meetings perhaps once or twice, if memory serves. For the first couple of years when the shop just opened, it remained a quiet, unused corner of the shop, always at the ready should a rare, formal gathering ever be required. But then, something happened with the logic of the space usage – the ‘meeting room’ transformed into ‘store-all-we-can’ room.

– Can you grab me a roll of tape? – Li asked one day, standing by the door, peering into the abyss.

– Sure, – I said, stepping inside with all the confidence of an archaeologist entering an uncharted tomb. My foot landed on something that crinkled ominously – a box of tissue paper, buried under bubble wrap. – I think the tape’s back here…behind this mountain of expired menus…

– Oh, those menus! – Li sighed dramatically. Remember when Damian insisted we’d run out in a week? And now here they are, taking up prime real estate.

Still, you might think: That must be the perfect setup for a thriving business! A decently sized office nestled in the very heart of England, right where the magic happens. A prime location, really – the kind of place that just begs you to imagine a bustling hub of commerce. Add to that an array of amazing products with packaging so attractive they practically leap off the shelves, prices so tempting they could charm even the stingiest of wallets. Top it all off with a small but allegedly professional team, and surely, you’d expect success to come waltzing in through the front door like an invited guest.

But let me stop you right there.

Because up to this day, I remain firmly convinced of one undeniable truth: you can have every ingredient for success in place, down to the last detail, but if you lack one crucial element – the willingness of your team to follow instructions and work together – well, you may as well just pack up your ambitions. And here’s the kicker: the number of employees doesn’t matter. It could be a sprawling corporate behemoth with thousands of workers or, like our operation, a cozy little setup with just under ten people. Chaos is not a respecter of headcounts. It’s a mindset, an art form, and it flourishes when even a few individuals decide that the rules don’t apply to them.

Take our team, for instance. Less than ten people, you’d think we’d be a well-oiled machine, moving in perfect harmony like one of those synchronized swimming teams at the Olympics. But instead, we were often more like an amateur improv group – everybody doing their own thing and hoping it would somehow come together in the end.

The problem? A few of our colleagues decided they were CEOs of their own little empires. Instructions? Optional. Teamwork? Overrated. It’s like watching a game of chess where half the players would be ignoring the rules, and the other half would be there just trying to figure out which pieces are missing.

Alright, let me just brew myself a quick cup of coffee while you settle in and acquaint yourself with the key characters in this story. It may take us some time to unravel precisely what’s going on here – and what everyone, in fact, does around this place. Fair warning: clarity isn’t exactly our specialty, and certainty is often in short supply.

So, if we find ourselves tangled in a web of half-explained happenings, I’d strongly suggest enjoying this little book with a generous dose of humour, and perhaps… a touch less analysis.

Steve, my dad, the Director – if there’s one word to describe him, it’s exceptional. Exceptionally intelligent, exceptionally skilled with numbers, and exceptionally hardworking. He didn’t just run the company; he held it together, patching cracks in its foundation before they turned into chasms and steering it away from disaster on more occasions than I could count. And no, this isn’t nepotism talking. This is cold, hard fact.

To be fair, this book doesn’t need much embellishment anyway. Exaggeration is unnecessary when the highs were truly high, and the lows were chaotic enough to make one question the very fabric of reality.

What truly amazed me was my dad’s tolerance for the cast of characters swirling around him, each more perplexing than the last. They’re not bad people, per se. Most of them had good intentions – or so we told ourselves during moments of fleeting optimism. But good intentions, as we all know, don’t necessarily translate into competence, and many of them lacked even a faint understanding of how to run a business.

Had I been in his shoes, I doubt I would have lasted a single day without losing my temper – or my mind. I sometimes wondered if my father secretly enjoyed the challenge – or if he simply refused to let the madness win. Whatever his reasons, his resilience was the glue that held us together. Because if even he had faltered, the rest of us wouldn’t have stood a chance.

Lijana (or just Li, as I often call her) – my colleague and a great friend, is involved in most of happenings of this book. Business assistant. Her presence always softened the edges of even the most chaotic day as she seemed born to bring a calming order to our little shop. She is the kind of person who is drawing others in with her genuine warmth. Yet, underneath her kindness is an unshakable sense of responsibility. A quiet yet powerful force that held things together. And then there is her gift for bringing humour into the most trying situations. Whenever the shop descended into a minor catastrophe – it was as if she knew that laughter could ease the tension and remind us all to breathe.

Marcus, the investor’s son. There’s no need to tiptoe around the truth here – the boy received special treatment. When Marcus joined the team, Li and I exchanged hopeful glances. ‘Finally’, we thought, ‘fresh blood, eager to learn. Surely, he’s here to soak up knowledge like a sponge, to master the practical side of the business he was destined to inherit’.

But Marcus’s arrival quickly turned our enthusiasm into bewilderment. It became clear, almost immediately, that in his mind, he didn’t need to learn anything – he already knew everything. Better than the rest of us combined, apparently.

With the confidence of someone who’s read half a manual and skipped to the conclusion, Marcus jumped from task to task as if the fate of the shop rested solely on his young, uncalloused shoulders. One minute, he was directing sales efforts; the next, he was dabbling in marketing strategies, before pivoting to order labels as though the entire supply chain would collapse without his intervention. He didn’t hesitate to remind us, subtly and not-so subtly, that we couldn’t possibly manage without him.

I caught him once – or maybe twice – in what I can only describe as a peculiar mood. I had just landed a substantial sale with one of my private clients, the kind of success that normally calls for a celebratory nod or at least a polite “well done.” But instead of congratulating me, Marcus stood there with a look of wounded disbelief, as if I had personally devoured those truffles in front of him without so much as offering him a bite or a “thank you.” Was he upset that I had made the sale, not him? Was he trying to telepathically remind me that, in this tiny universe of truffles, he was meant to be the star salesman? Or was it something even more mysterious, locked away in the labyrinth of Marcus’s enigmatic mind? I couldn’t say.

Damian. The investor. We often just referred to him as ‘D’ instead of Damian when talking among ourselves. A man of distinctly varied temperaments, ranging from enthusiastic visionary to stern critic with little warning. On a good day, you might catch him in an inspired mood. In this state, he was brimming with ideas so abundant and random they seemed to fill the very room, leaving little space for anything else. These ideas were entirely self-generated and delivered with such enthusiasm that one might mistake them for a gift you hadn’t realised you needed.

But on his less charitable days, D’s fountain of ideas dried up, replaced instead by a downpour of criticism. And not the constructive kind. No, his critiques were as far from the truth as the shop was from being the most ‘luxurious boutique’ he often described in his pitches.

The problem wasn’t just his mood swings, though. It was that everything with Damian eventually got personal.

His mornings at the shop followed a predictable routine. He’d arrive, sometimes with his driver, other times on his bicycle. After greeting no one in particular, he’d make himself a coffee and settle in, surveying the shop like a general preparing to rally his troops.

If you were quick, you might manage to appear busy enough to avoid his attention. Polishing the same glass for the fourth time or furiously reorganising an already pristine shelf often did the trick. But if you miscalculated – or worse, hesitated – you’d find yourself trapped in D’s volcanic imagination.

And then it would begin.

– How about we go around to the neighbours and drop off some leaflets? – he’d start. – In exchange, we can display their information in the shop. A win-win!

Now, the trick here was to respond with just enough enthusiasm to seem engaged but not so much that it encouraged further elaboration.

– "Yeah”, you’d say, nodding as if this were the most groundbreaking idea you’d ever heard. “That could work. We could ask a few…”

But before you’d even finished your sentence, his mind had already launched into another orbit.

– Or we could host a small event here, something cultural. Maybe a wine tasting! Or a cooking demo. Yes! That would bring people in, don’t you think?

You’d nod again, trying to keep up, but it was no use. By the time D reached his third or fourth idea – “How about a charity raffle? Maybe we should start a blog!” – your brain was as scrambled as the shop’s inventory system.

The real skill, of course, was pretending to retain all this information. As he rattled off proposal after proposal, you’d nod solemnly, as if mentally cataloguing each suggestion for later action. In reality, you’d forgotten the first idea by the time he got to the second, and by the fifth, you were simply trying to keep a straight face.

And then, as suddenly as it started, the brainstorming session would end. D would sip his americano, gaze around the shop with a satisfied air, and declare,

“Right, I’ll leave you to it.”

Once he’d left, the shop would return to its usual rhythm, and I’d gather with Li to debrief, piecing together fragments of Damian’s monologue. But by then, we’d be too relieved to care.

– What was the first idea again? – I’d ask, squinting at my notes.

– Something about leaflets? – Li would reply, equally confused.

– Was it before or after the blog?

But by the time we’d sorted it out, it hardly mattered.

Ivor was, without question, one of the most intriguing characters to pass through our shop. A man of principle – or at least one principle, which he wielded with unshakable conviction: “Sorry, I don’t think so, but thank you for your understanding.”

This phrase became his universal shield, fending off any request that even hinted at inconvenience. We heard it so often that Li and I seriously considered having it emblazoned on custom t-shirts for the entire team, as a kind of inside joke and battle cry.

– Hey, Ivor, do you think you could cover Friday this week? We’ll take Saturday for you.

– Sorry, I don’t think so, ladies, but thank you for your understanding.

– Alright, how about we swap another day instead?

– I’m sorry, but… – Cue the pause, the apologetic shrug, and that familiar conclusion: …thank you for your understanding.

To be fair, this catchphrase didn’t define him entirely. Ivor was, without a doubt, the best of us when it came to dealing with customers. His quick wit and self-deprecating humour could turn even the most demanding client into a satisfied one. In fact, his humour was so disarming that Li and I sometimes wondered if he was quietly mocking us, even as we laughed along.

It wasn’t that Ivor didn’t work – he just worked selectively, prioritizing tasks that showcased his talents or allowed him to charm his way out of trouble. The problem was that the shop didn’t run on charm alone.

The last Christmas that Ivor graced the company with his presence before his eventual dismissal was, in many ways, the prefect encapsulation of his unique managerial style – or lack thereof. True to form, he managed to negotiate a schedule of half-shifts during the busiest season of the year. What’s more infuriating, everyone – apart from Li and me, of course – seemed to accept it without question.

No, we were decidedly not okay with this arrangement. Red-faced from hauling boxes up and down the stairs, we found ourselves glaring at the clock as Ivor would saunter out at precisely 2 o’clock, delivering his signature dry farewell: “See you tomorrow, ladies.” And this was the store manager.

– What’s the point of him even showing up? – Li would sigh, as we finally collapsed for a well-earned coffee break after packing and shipping more boxes than we cared to count.

– Exactly, – I’d agree, – He just creates more unnecessary chaos.

For a while, it truly seemed that his peculiar working hours and minimal contribution were being tolerated, if not outright condoned. But patience is a finite resource. While the investor remained cheerfully convinced that Ivor was the shop’s hardest worker, my father had started to see through his façade of charm, and decided it was time to issue a formal warning.

Manager’s response, predictably, was to take it personally. His attitude toward us shifted almost immediately, and the passive-aggressiveness that had always simmered beneath the surface boiled over.

Li and I still chuckle – albeit bitterly – about one particular gem he posted in the group chat during his final days of glory:

“Ladies, could you please not leave the sponge on the sink? Unless you want to get three stars for hygiene rating.”

– Unbelievable, – I muttered to Li, – Like we’re the only ones using that sponge. And what’s the connection between a sponge and the shop’s hygiene rating? Is he trying to make us look stupid?

– Whatever his reasons, it doesn’t make him a better manager, – Li said with her usual, dry wisdom.