Are You Making Money with Marley Majcher

Are you making money in your business? That's a question that we'll explore in this episode with Marley Majcher, the CEO of two companies: The Party Goddess and The Profit Goddess, and author of the book, "But Are You Making Any Money?" Early in her entrepreneurial career, Marley discovered that being busy and being profitable were not the same thing. She is passionate about showing business owners why they need to understand their numbers. On this episode of the Live. Love. Engage. podcast: Marley recounts how she became the CEO of two businesses The challenges Marley had early on to be profitable What shifted for Marley to focus on business financials Why Marley wrote her book, "But are you making any money?" How Marley wound up running two businesses at the same time The common problem business owners share Why tracking the time spent on daily activities is a powerful exercise The new project that Marley is up to now What Marley's biggest life lesson is The value of getting to the root of the problem Connect with Marley Free Video Series: mini.theprofitgoddess.com Twitter: @thepartygoddess Instagram: @thepartygoddess or @theprofitgoddess Quick Links: Join the Live. Love. Engage. Community Intuitive Business Coaching The Live. Love. Engage. Book Support the Podcast with BuyMeACoffee.com Enjoying what you're hearing on Live. Love. Engage.? Subscribe on Goodpods or your favorite podcast platform, and click here to leave a 5 STAR Review. You can also watch the conversation on YouTube. TRANSCRIPT Gloria Grace Rand: Namaste. I am delighted to be with you for another edition of Live Love Engage, and I've got a awesome guest in on the show today who is a powerhouse woman, and I'm gonna tell you all about her in just a second. But first, I wanna welcome Marley Majcher to live love engage. Marley Majcher: Hello. Thank you. Gloria Grace Rand: Yeah, I am delighted to have you here cuz I've, I've actually, and we haven't even had a chance to talk about this beforehand, but I, I've been aware of you for quite some time. I heard you speak many moons ago and at a, at a conference and so when I saw your name come up, I'm like, wait, I know her. I know her. And, and I think you've, you've, you're even more evolved than you were when I first met you. So let me tell you about Marley. So she is a party planning and entrepreneurial expert that people turn to for all things entertaining. So she is the CEO of the party goddess, which is a nationally acclaimed full service event planning and catering company where she's has entertained the likes of top tier businesses to a-list celebrities like Snoop Dogg, Britney Spears. And then as if that isn't enough, she's also a top business coach in Los Angeles and an author of the book, Gloria Grace Rand: "But are you making any money?" Yeah, that's, that's, that's a good one. Um, , I think a lot of people struggle with that sometimes entrepreneurs. Um, and so you are just this really all around amazing woman who is not only got one business when a lot of people have trouble just getting one business off the ground. You've got two going. So I would love to have you share with our listeners and viewers what got you to where you are today. How did you wind up being, you know, the c... the party goddess and the prophet goddess ? Marley Majcher: Well, uh, yeah, so it would take about four hours, but I'm gonna make it as brief as I possibly can. So I went, I got my business degree from Georgetown and I, you know, everybody who kind of goes to Georgetown, like you think they're gonna end up like in venture capital or like they're working for Bear Stearns or something. And I just knew that was not my path and for one of my classes in business school, I had to do a talk, what I knew more about than anybody else. And at Georgetown there was nothing. I was like, mom, there's nothing I know more than these people. And so she was just like, why don't you do it on French cooking? You just came back from cooking school. So, uh, I was like, great, I had just come back from Paris. So I figured, okay, I'll do this. Marley Majcher: And then I run into my professor right after the, this assignment got announced and I was like, oh my gosh, I'm so excited. I'm in your class and I'm doing it on French cooking and I'm interviewing the chef from 1789. Well, anybody who's familiar with Washington DC 1789 is this like very fancy restaurant. I did not have an interview with the chef. Never thought of having an interview with the chef and was like, what the frick have I done? And so she was so excited and I went home in tears to my roommates and I'm like, oh my gosh, now I've gotta get this, this fricking interview with this guy or girl I didn't even know. So my roommate's like, no worries, I used to work there, I'll get you the interview. I was like, I just don't wanna get kicked outta school. Like I just need to have, like, I have talked to him and put it on my deal and call it a day. Marley Majcher: So anyway, she gets me this interview, I take one look at him, I decide I need to marry him. Um, literally, and here I'm doing this interview and like this, the bowels of this, you know, kind of like townhouse basically, which is how 1789 was set up. And I'm like the whole time thinking, how am I talking about multitasking with multiple businesses? It started early because the whole time I'm thinking, how am I gonna marry him and do this interview? So I'm doing the interview, but I'm also kind of like have my business brain on and I'm thinking to myself, wait, I noticed a couple things. He didn't speak Spanish fluently and I did or had I, maybe at that point I didn't, but I had add a lot of Spanish from school and I was taking Spanish in college. So I was like, okay. Marley Majcher: Then the next thing I noticed, you know, there were no chicks and they had souffles on the menu and souffles are notoriously difficult for restaurants to have on the menu and turn out, you know, regularly and consistently. So I was like, okay, keep that in mind. So fast forward, I'm interviewing him and I'm like thinking this is kind of gonna be my pitch. And I was like, well, can I just come back or like, you know, shadow you again? And he's like, you know, like, how, what are, are you doing a dissertation or what's going on? So anyway, I convinced him to go back and then I just basically like was like, oh well maybe like I could work a shift or something. And he was kinda like, you know, not like, you're not really the type in here. Cause it was all men. Marley Majcher: They, most of 'em were like from Honduras and El Salvador and like career kitchen people. And I was like, no, I really wanna do this. So I did that for, um, my whole junior year. And of course, you know, nothing happened. And then I would go on like full hair and makeup every day. Two third I would get outta school at 2:30 and then I'd go 3:30 to 11:30 3 days a week. And uh, my parents were like, your grades go down. Now my, my grades weren't that great to start with, but I made the dean's list like for the first time in my life I was like, I am not giving up my future husband. So then the whole summer before senior year I went to his cooking school in Normandy, plotted the whole summer how I was gonna ruin his life and quit. Cause of course I was his best employee. Marley Majcher: I was picking up every shift and then he's asked me out and I was like, wait, what? And then we got engaged the month after graduation. Well when you marry a chef what do you do? You get into the restaurant business. So then it was like, okay, so we got into the restaurant business but here I am, I'm 21 years old and newly married. By now I'm married now it's 22. By the time I'm married I'm getting into the restaurant business and he's 20 years older than I am. And like, okay, we're back in Pasadena where I grew up. And so there started my new life in the food business I guess. I mean I was like, okay, well this is taking an interesting turn. And so basically he was in charge of obviously the food in the back of the house cause he was an amazing chef and I was in charge of the front of the house and I use those words loosely because I might have had the responsibility. Marley Majcher: I'm not sure I was so great at it. But, so anyway, this goes on and you know, very early on we get a lot of publicity and it was like New York Super Chef is, you know, in town with this new restaurant, yada, yada. But what happened to me, which is what happens to a lot of entrepreneurs is that I could, I was, I certainly knew my numbers from business school, but I didn't know how to take what I learned in business school and the principles of like a P and L and then, and then how much of a delay there is getting your P and L from your accountant, like however many three months later to really understand your numbers and really like see, oh, if we have events, this is gonna be more profitable than if we don't like meaning within the restaurant. And so I just got caught up in this whole thing of like more sales, more sales, more sales and more publicity, more publicity, more publicity instead of focusing on what were my core numbers, what were my margins? Marley Majcher: And which happens a lot. An independent restaurant, it certainly happens a lot with independent, you know, businesses. And so before long, um, you know, my, my goal is to do a million dollars in sales, we did that the first year. I was like, yes, now one problem is you can do a million dollars in sales, but if you're spending a million too, um, you should probably consider that maybe you haven't hit your goal. But I was like, oh no, that was my goal so I'm good. Um, but in reality I was just, everything looked amazing on the outside, you know, and this is in the days before social media. So can you imagine how I would've had it all tricked o