FredMcKinnon.Com

Anyone who follows my thoughts in this big cyberspace is quite familiar with my affection for Apple.  I love Apple products and have been a faithful Apple user since college.  (for those who are counting, that would be nearly 20 years)!  Despite my passion for Apple, I blogged a while back about “Why I’m Not Getting a Verizon iPhone” and “How This Apple Addict Fell in Love with the DroidX“.  Google stepped in and started changing the way my life was surrounded by Apple products.

With the recent announcement of the “Amazon Cloud Drive” and the “Amazon Cloud Player” I can’t help but wonder if Amazon is about to join Google in assaulting the massive market share of Apple’s dominance in the digital media world.

One of the most frustrating issues in dealing with my iTunes libraries across multiple computers is the lack of sync.  Sure, there are products out there that supposedly help you sync your iTunes libraries together across multiple computers.  I’ve tried some of this software and didn’t have a lot of success.

I have 2 primary iTunes accounts.  One account is for personal purchases and the other is for purchases I make through my Church account.  These get all mixed up and in my eagerness to get a new song over the weekend on my home computer I later find that it’s not on my church laptop.  Now, with the addition of a new studio computer at SSCC I have a 3rd location where I want to hear my music.  Having iTunes libraries from two separate accounts on 3-4 different computers is a real hassle … not to mention the issues of iPod syncing.

With thew new Amazon Cloud Drive I can begin uploading all of my music to the “cloud”.  (Travis, those quotes were JUST for you).  This gives me access to my music via web and the Android-based Amazon Player on my DroidX.

Granted, you only get 5 GB of free online storage but that’s quite a bit of storage and the price to increase storage is minimal.  To make things even better, if you purchase your music from Amazon.Com instead of via iTunes (the pricing is typically the same with less sync/copy restrictions) the music can be stored in your Amazon Cloud without using your storage space.

Want that new album?

Buy it on iTunes and it’s restricted to a few places.  Even to get the music on a different computer at all requires physically copying the files.
Buy it on Amazon and it’s available on your computer, on your phone, and in the cloud – accessible from any computer, any time, with web access.

I could be wrong but I think this will pose a serious challenge to the way Apple manages our media purchases and storage.  In the end, it’s all about access and convenience.  By the looks of this new Amazon Cloud, they have a promising product.

For me, I’m uploading music RIGHT NOW to the cloud.

What about you?

SAVE THE DATE:

October 23 – October 26, 2011

On these dates, a dream will become a reality. Hosted by Fred McKinnon here on one of the most beautiful places on earth: St. Simons Island, GA.

A sabbatical-style getaway for 3 days of rest, solitude, recreation, worship, and encouragement.  For those who want to rediscover that “still, small voice”.  For those who are weary from the trials of leading.  For those who are desperate for inspiration and vision.  Designed for those in ministry but available to anyone from Pastors, Worship Leaders, Executives, to Stay-At-Home Moms.

Interested?  Stay tuned …

Hey Gang,

Time for a Monday Muse.  I ask a question … and you answer.  Be sure to click the “subscribe to comments” button when you leave your comment so you can be engaged in the ongoing discussion, ok?

So, I’m reading Ephesians 5 this morning and I’m always challenged by that chapter as a Husband and as a Christian.

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her”.
(Ephesians 5:25)

So here’s the question:

Men:  what are some specific ways you can (or do) show love for your wife?  (Dial the x-rated stuff down to R if you are going there, ok!?)

Ladies:  what are some specific ways you WISH that your husband would show you love?

Singles:  answer it based on what your desires would be.

Please consider joining this discussion and inviting others to do the same.  If you are uncomfortable answering, feel free to just put “anonymous” as the name and “nobody@nobody.com” as the email address (just don’t check the subscribe to comments box, as it will be bouncing back to me!).

This post is Part 2 of a series on the story of how HPP Enterprises, an e-commerce company, was born.  Read Part 1 here.

In my search for companies that would wholesale toys I kept hitting websites that promised to sell “thousands of products” at wholesale that people would buy.  I learned about this thing called “dropshipping” – where you don’t have to stock inventory or own a warehouse.  Companies would let you sell their product and would “dropship” it to your customer.  In many cases they would ship to the customer with YOUR NAME on the box and packing slip, called a “blind drop ship”, leaving the actual supplier and shipper invisible to the customer.

I think I probably stayed up all night … reading, searching, reviewing.  Most of these sites were clearly affiliate-driven sites trying to earn money off my clicks and signups.  I found companies that wanted lots of money in monthly dues or subscription fees.  I found sites offering “lists” for a fee that would give me the secret information I needed to make millions.  Most of them felt like scams.

At the end of the night, I decided to take a gamble.  I purchased a “membership” to one of these sites.  (I keep saying I’m going to write an e-book some day with all the nitty gritty details!)  With this membership I was able to search for the products I wanted to sell and find suppliers who would dropship for me.  Within a day or so I’d chosen a few, filled out the “open an account” forms and was well on my way.

My gamble paid off.  The information I purchased was golden – the company, reputable – the suppliers, real.  Since selling video games and toys didn’t seem to fit under the original vision statement of “Highest Praise Productions” (the parent company), I created a new DBA, “HPP Enterprises” – the HPP of course, an acronym for the parent corporation.  Somehow, in the midst of this process, I learned how to upload inventory to sites like Amazon.Com and Ebay.  A day or so later we received our first “Sold:  Ship Now” email!

So that is how a business was born.  10 years later, HPP Enterprises has moved way past dropshipping a few packages to a handful of random customers.  We are networked with suppliers from across the globe, we dropship, we warehouse, and operate a handful of niche-stores online and enjoy prominent exposure on major marketplaces such as Amazon.Com, Buy.Com, Ebay, and the Sears.Com Marketplace.  We have an amazing staff who log countless hours of hard work and customer service, 365 days a year.  And looking forward, the sky is the limit.

That’s our story.  Hope it inspires you … not to become an e-commerce entrepreneur so much, but to chase your dreams.  To be willing to take risks and actions that can change lives.  That’s living life … and living it to the full.

Preface: I saw a “tweet” from Dave Ramsey the other day that said “Business Owners – Share Your Story Often, Your Team Needs to Hear It”.  (or something like that).  I “retweeted” it and decided to do it right here.  So for today, the Worship Leader/Music Guy in me puts on the Entrepreneurial Hat to tell the story of how HPP Enterprises was born.

I’ve always been a little entrepreneur.  I was that kid on his bicycle trying to win the grand prize at school for selling the most wrapping paper or all-occasion cards.  I can’t begin to count how many cases of “Caramel, Almond, and Krunch” candy bars I moved.  By high school the neighbors closed their blinds, shut off the lights, and locked the doors at the sight of my pedaling up their drive way as if I were the re-po man from the furniture store.

Rewind to somewhere around November 2004.  In addition to leading worship for our church I had been operating a music company called “Highest Praise Productions” and it’s web-hosting subsidiary, “HPP Christian Web Solutions”.  That’s a different story altogether … several, actually.  My older brother, Rob McKinnon,  called and his line was something like this:

“Fred, you’re knowledgeable about the web … can you help me find some Lego Bionicles for Ethan’s birthday … they are sold out everywhere”.

That request changed my life.  I googled and searched.  I scoured Ebay.  I sorted Ebay by “completed listings” and saw that every time somebody listed these, they SOLD.  As hard as I was trying to find an answer to Rob’s question, all I could think of was this “new question” that raced through my mind:

“Where can I buy these in bulk so I can resell them”?

Randy Elrod, one of my mentors, has a saying:
“Find where your passion intersects a need and you may have an entrepreneurial opportunity”.  (see his blog post)

I can’t say that I had a passion for selling Legos, but I did have a passion for making supplemental income and starting businesses.  My wife, Joy, often says that if I had a job with a million-dollar salary, I’d still be meddling around in little business opps.  It’s in my DNA.

I don’t think that I was much help to my big brother.  But his request was a big help to me.  My searching quickly turned to “where to buy wholesale toys” instead of “who is selling Bionicles”.  And that search was the beginning of HPP Enterprises.

(be sure and checkout Part 2, “My Gamble, and How It Paid Off“, that will be published next).