We are so proud to be involved in the home building business, and many of our customers are small privately owned companies that build homes for local families.

All of our Lifestylist® companies are built around the idea that if we buy from local companies and support our local businesses we help them to become homeowners and live the all American dream of owning a home of your own.We loved the 8 years that we were the Lifestylist® for Patriot Homes - we always did at least one Patriotic themed model home, and I think they were my favorites.

I’d like to say that I’m an example of dreams coming true – I married early, never finished college but here I am owning my own business and being able to help others.

If you are looking for a Lifestylist® to help merchandise and add Lifestyle to your homes, please contact us at: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. , or take a look at our website at: www.lifestylist.com

Let’s all support locally owned businesses and bring jobs back to America!

Lifestylist Design and SE Homes of Texas are proud to announce a very special promotion where they will not only help retailers with the merchandising of their new model homes, they will also provide social media tools to help promote their homes as well.

Having great photography is critical when you are promoting your homes using social media, and this program will provide the participating retailers with a beautifully merchandised model home, photography and a YouTube video of their retail center, community, and homes.

For more information, contact SE Homes of Texas at: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

I am a believer in full disclosure so I wanted to share that the manager of the Best Buy near my office called today and really tried to make things better. He made me a very generous offer but as I told him I wasn't trying to profit from this experience or take advantage of the system - I just wanted what I had paid for. At this point I'm done - Atlas Electronics gave me better customer service than any Best Buy could and I'm thrilled to have learned about Atlas through this experience.

What has been really interesting is that the Wall Street Journal talks about Best Buy and then Yahoo Finance published a story  - "Best Buy Implodes". I guess this Lifestylist® saw that trend coming - and I wasn't the only one!

What a crazy, busy month! Between people starting to think about buying a new home again, local produce coming back to the Farmers Market, trend reports to write and speeches to prepare... we've hardly had time to enjoy this beautiful weather.

I wish I had been reading Forbes more often, because if I had seen this article on on "Why Best Buy is Going Out of Business Gradually" I never would have bought an expensive item from Best Buy.

To me my time is one of the most valuable things I have, and I'll often spend a little more on purchases to make sure I'm not wasting time on them in the future. I have no luck with lawn mowers, so when I buy one I usually buy the extended warranty. The same goes with electronics - I'm a plug and play kind of gal, and that's about as much as I want to know about them - they turn on, they turn off.

Never fail, in the middle of a bunch of deadlines my projection TV went out. I originally bought it for when the grandbabies come to visit, but it's also amazing watching my favorite cooking and design shows on the big screen. A lot of what being a Lifestylist® is about is keeping up with trends, and it's amazing how much you can learn just by channel surfing.

When I bought a projection TV at Best Buy I bought the warranty because I know bulbs go out and I was told they would be covered. Best Buy with their Black Tie Geek service would have me back in business ASAP if I ever had any trouble so it would keep me worry free as long as the warranty was in effect. When my projector stopped working I called the help desk, and when I talked to the Geek Squad they told me this wasn't something they would come out and fix, they would send me the part and I would have to install it myself. Not exactly what I signed up for, but how hard could it be? They transferred me to their parts department, I gave them all of the information again and a week later the bulb showed up.

The problem though was that it was the wrong bulb. I called up again, asked for a supervisor because by then I was not happy. I spoke with someone who said they were a supervisor, but after wasting my time and arguing with me about how I needed to send the wrong bulb back before they would send me the right one, even though it was their mistake that I received the incorrect part. I finally did get a supervisor who said they would send out the right bulb. Check on it the next day, not not only did he not send it out, he hadn't even placed the order!

Fast forward to week 3. The ground shipped bulb finally arrives and when I take it out I see it is not even close to being the correct one. I again call, get put on hold for 30 minutes with no one ever picking up the customer service line, and by this time I am furious. I have been treated so poorly by more Best Buy employees than I have time to write about by now -  it's just principle they make this right.

So I do what saavy consumers do these days when they are having problems - I go to Facebook. I let them know how unhappy I am, and "Jesse" asks me to send them an email so he can help me. I immediately do that and get the following response: "Your message has been received by the ECC Social Media Team at Best Buy. We strive to provide as prompt a response as possible.  A member of our team will do their best to assist you within up to 3-5 business days." Talk about the wrong thing to say to an upset customer! I had already been waiting 3 weeks! They asked ME to contact them! So I go back to Facebook and see that I'm not alone. As with any social media there are some crazies who write, but there are also a lot of legit, upset customers that are just trying to get what they paid for. One gentleman wrote " I talked to two managers at the store and was told by both of them there was nothing they were going to do. They said they could have done something but were not going to." THAT's the problem! They make sure you know they have the authority to fix things but choose not to.

As week 4 of my saga arrived, I continued to try and get them to honor the warranty but got excuses like "I do not have access to any tracking numbers for this bulb. I do not work in our parts department, and all information I get on this would only be able to be acquired by contacting them." This came from corporate - they can't access orders and tracking information or at least act like they are trying to make the effort to help me? My favorite though was "How do you know the lamp you received is not the correct model?" I got this after I sent them photos of the 2nd replacement that was a 3" bulb next to the correct bulb that was 1".

Then I was told that Best Buy couldn't get the correct part in a timely manner- it was backordered. So I could take my projector to the store, have them ship it to their repair place, they could then wait for the bulb, then they would ship it back to me. OR I could source the bulb myself, buy it, install it, and then they would send me a check after I filled out all of the necessary paperwork. So I would be out what I paid for the warranty and the cost of the new bulb (which cost around $200).

Good news - there is a happy ending, but not involving Best Buy. After dealing with all of this frustration for a month (and dug up my entire garden beds to let off steam) I gave up. I realized they had no interest in keeping me as a customer or earning my business so I went online and after searching for about 2 minutes I discovered Atlas Electronics. I called to see if they had the bulb I'd been waiting a month for and they said of course - it's a very common bulb. If I came down to their store I could pick it up right away, and they would be happy to install it for me while I waited!

Five minutes later I was happily watching Sam Khoury install my bulb as John Khoury chatted with us. They are a small family owned business who takes pride in the service and customer service that they offer and understand referrals are the best form of advertising. After watching Sam do surgery on my machine I saw there was no way I would have been able to install that bulb properly myself, so I was so thrilled I found Atlas. If I had waited for Best Buy to hopefully send me the correct bulb it would have been another few weeks and Best Buy STILL wouldn't have resolved the issue. I'm now back in my office happily catching up on all of the research I haven't been able to do.

All of us, especially Best Buy can learn from the Khoury family. I was so happy with the experience that when I stopped to get BBQ at the original Sonny Bryan's (local) around the corner the manager heard me talking about Atlas and how happy I was with the experience.He said he had something to get fixed but was thinking about buying a new one at Best Buy, but now he would go to Atlas to see if they could repair what he had. So by being so great, Atlas already has another customer.

As soon as I start harvesting all of the goodies in my freshly weeded garden I'll be taking some over to share over to the Atlas Electronics family. Be sure to "like" their Facebook page so you can learn more about what they do. If you aren't in the Dallas area they ship parts as well. I love the fact that they were able to have a part that Best Buy didn't!

I try to be organized, I really do. But between the massive amounts of catalogs I get every day from companies that want me to use their products in my LifeStyled homes to inquiries about the Lifestylist brand, it can get overwhelming pretty quickly. Being on the road so much also makes it difficult - I usually come home to a mountain of paper.

When I was meeting with a client this week, they asked me how I would like to receive information from them and I answered very quickly that I would prefer getting information electronically. That way it can also find me wherever I am in a timely manner.

The key to what makes information important for starters is that it can be found! If someone sends critical details to me at the wrong adress, or uses a title on an email that would make it sound like junk or spam I might overlook it. Or I might read it, open it, close it, then never be able to find it again.

In these days of electronic correspondence, the title of the email should be one that is searchable if I need to search for the information in the future, immediately let me know what the topic is, and preferably be from an email address that would let me know it's from you.

If I'm taking the time to write something I hope that someone will read it, and by taking a little extra time to send it properly it has a chance of being read.

Seth Godin is my guru. He is so no nonsense but funny at times, intellectual but down to earth, and what I really love about him is that he can get a point across faster than anyone else I know. His Purple Cow book started me on a new road to being more involved in marketing and social media so I’m forever grateful. When I worked on the Purple Cow House Campaign with Patriot Homes I made sure to get permission from Mr. Godin, and we credited him for the phrase (and gave out his Purple Cow Book).

 Today I got a great post from him titled “Simple Thoughts About Fair Use“. So timely, and as always so well written. In this new blogging, social world I’m always stunned to see how many people are using other people’s photography, ads, brands, and stories without permission. This article is a must read for anyone who is even thinking about posting on Facebook, Twitter, or a blog and using someones text or images.

 I’m fortunate enough to have access to a very talented photographer – Lisa Stewart of Lisa Stewart Photography. The images you see in my blogs, on my Lifestylist Design Facebook page and on my website have been shot specifically for my use. I do that so I’m not using other people’s work and having copyright infringements.

 Lifestylist® is a term that I successfully trademarked in 2002 – my registration number is 2583235. I’m very proud of this because I thought I had a good idea and made the extra effort do “do the right thing” and spend the time, effort, and money to trademark it. You would be amazed at how much time I’ve had to spend since them protecting my mark because people haven’t bothered to do their homework and see that it’s trademarked before they use it in their own businesses.

 Before you decide that you have discovered the next great phrase, or “borrow” a photo from someone else be sure to read Seth’s post. Wondering where to learn more about these topics? The US Patent and Trademark Office has a great site, and it is also where you can search trademark registrations and applications.

Making goals and resolutions with the start of a new year is such a cliche in some ways , but if it makes people want to better themselves I don’t see them as a bad thing.

Yesterday I was lucky enough to have dinner with the very dynamic Geri Higgins – CEO and President of Portfolio Kitchen and Home in Kansas City. Her beautiful new flagship store is a destination, and she is a wonderful role model for business owners everywhere.

One of the things I love about Geri is her attitude. She is always positive and motivating, and having the chance to share my ideas and dreams with her about my business got me even more excited about the opportunities I have in front of me. Geri never looks at things as problems or comes up with 100 objections as to why something won’t work, she sees these as opportunities and actually gets excited about what can be accomplished and comes up with a plan to make things happen.

As a Lifestylist® I deal with a very diverse group of clients – both companies and individuals. When teams or management have objections to every new idea or opportunity no good changes will ever happen. But if they are opening to looking at issues as an opportunity and seeing how they can become a growth area, then you have a company or individual that will succeed and flourish.

So I have a new Lifestylist® goal: instead of looking for excuses and objections as to why I can’t find the time to exercise, or get my office organized I’m going to take Geri’s lead and tackle things head on. I really did start on my office and unearthed this photo of myself mountain climbing in Tucson. I arrived at the top and sunset and it was spectacular. Climbing straight up a mountain on the end of a rope was one of the most frightening but exciting things I’ve ever done – I just had to stop thinking about all of the reasons I couldn’t do it and get out there and give it a try.

Here’s to a new year filled with opportunities!