Episode 32 Gather Mountain Blooms

(music)

Joe: Hi there. I’m Joe Dudeck, president and founder of Keyhole Marketing.

Shannon: And I’m Shannon Jirik. I work for Keyhole as the assistant brand manager.

Joe: And this is Metaphorically Speaking, a podcast that explores the mysterious side of marketing.

Shannon: Thanks for joining us on the Metaphorically Speaking podcast. In this episode, we talk with the lovely Nikki, Leah Remacle and Abby three sisters who run, gather mountain blooms on the historic Venetucci farm in Colorado Springs. So Joe, you actually got a chance to visit the farm for this interview. Talk about that a little bit.

Joe: Yeah, it was nice to get out of the office and not do it digitally the whole time. Part of that was because we tried it digitally and it didn’t work. So we ended up rescheduling in person and it was great. It’s in an old farmhouse part of the Venetucci farm, which not a growing up around here. I wasn’t really that familiar with, but a lot of families who have grown up in the area remembered as kids go in there to get pumpkins at fall time and just having a harvest kind of experiences. And at farmers no longer used, I believe for that, but they were able to rent some space on the land and I’ve taken over the farm house there. And I think two of the sisters live in the farm house and just gave me a tour of that, of the, of the property that they’re filling with flowers of the barn that they use for some events, for weddings, and even gave me a little tour, like in the basement of the farmhouse, where they germinated seeds and, you know, controlled some of the growing experience down there. And they even have a shop where they sell flowers. You can stop in there and get flowers for, for somebody that are freshly picked from, from the, from the farm there. So very cool.

Shannon: Yeah. I think this might be the first interview we’ve done with siblings. Am I right about that?

Joe: Yeah, it’s definitely the first with three siblings. So yeah, that was interesting. I kind of, I guess maybe thinking about my own siblings, I was expecting a little bit more animosity between maybe try to even probe for a little bit of like opportunity to, to take some jabs. And they were just so nice to each other. So either that’s really how they are or really how they microphone.

Shannon: No, I, I thought it was just so cool that you really can pick up on kind of how real they are and how raw the emotion they were feeling was, you know, you just, without them even saying it upfront, you know, there’s so much history there, just the struggle, the joy, everything they’ve been through as sisters, as a family. And just to see them turn that into a business with so much in so many values behind it and so much history behind it and then leaving other careers to follow a dream like this was just so, so cool to hear.

Joe: Yeah. We love capturing the plot twist that that business owners experience that led them to start their businesses. You know, a lot of times it’s, it’s a slight storyline change and other times it’s like this, where there are lots of twists and turns for all the people involved. And I think it’s makes for a great story. And I just loved that they were all very vulnerable about their own journeys through it. And certainly didn’t mean to start off with a tear jerking question to begin with. Right. Sometimes it goes that way, but I just knew like, they feel like this is a safe space to share that. And I appreciated that.

Shannon: Absolutely. I think we’ve been so blessed to just meet people in the community who are willing to be so vulnerable with us, you know, even meeting us for the first time and just being open about their stories and just real about what they’re feeling. So we just want to say thank you to Nikki, Leah and Abby for just bringing us into your story and allowing us to share that with a lot of other people. So we hope the rest of you enjoy this conversation and get a chance to visit Gather Mountain Blooms when you have a chance.

Joe: Kind of give a sense of like who we’re talking to. I’d love to like give you guys a chance to describe each other because you’re three sisters. We know that, but I wanted you not to describe yourself or describe somebody on your right. So maybe you could each just introduce yourself quickly and then like, describe who is the person to your right? How would you characterize that person? Whoever wants to start.

Gather Mountain Blooms (GMB): So this is Nikki talking and Leah is on my right. So Aliyah has this creativity that just flows out of her. It’s like incredible because you think it would be really hard and she makes it look so easy. So she creates a space here. That’s so beautiful and inviting for everybody that comes, you know, I don’t know how, how much we want to describe about background and everything, but just talking about like who she is and what she does on the farm for us is she just brings a lot of joy to the space. She does all of our wedding florals. She makes our farm store look gorgeous. She does all of our floral creations. She has the biggest heart. She’s like somebody that will like cry if you are crying or there’s somebody, her, she just feels deeply. So yes, that beautiful, beautiful person. Thanks girl. And I know we’re all gonna start, try not to cry.

My name is Leah. I’m Leah speaking right now. And to my right is Abby. She’s our baby sister, the youngest of the family. And she is the most caring but fun, energetic person to have around you. She’s always going to bring a story and a life to whoever is around us. She’s very inclusive. Includes everybody loves everybody. She’s also the hardest worker I’ve ever seen. She’s our lead farmer. So she’s out there at 6:00 AM every single day. It doesn’t matter if she’s gonna get up and she’s gonna be out there because that’s what she said she would do. She has also completely transformed her world this year, just moving from California to here. And I’m starting something brand new. She didn’t, you know, in the beginning, she’s planting all these seeds, not having a single clue, what the seeds are going to look like, what flowers she was going to be creating by planting all these seeds. So it’s been so much fun to see all of her work blossoming in our fields. Like our fields would not be what they are without Abby. Abby is the true workforce behind that. And she’s kind of the life of the party. So totally loves people. She loves to have a good time. She loves to make sure you’re having a good time and she’s always going to be there for you. So it’s awesome.

Okay. Abby speaking, and to my right is Nikki. It’s just hard to put everything that Nikki is in towards the most strongest individual that I know in my life, who, I mean, no matter what, we’ll make you feel like the most important person in the room. And, you know, I don’t believe that we would be where we are today without Nikki. And to just watch her have the resilience of just head first into anything in life really. And the challenges that life does bring, how she just with grace and dignity just carries through each and every day. And, you know, I think it’s pretty amazing that everything that she has been through, you know, at the end of the day, I think I just heard an answer one time of she’s like, why do I, why am I entitled to feel a hundred percent when there’s so many people in the world struggling? So as far as the farm goes, she’s the brains of the operation. Yeah. You know, I’ve planted a bunch of seeds, but I would have never known where to start or how to start. And she’s just dive head first and kind of person and super inspirational, super encouraging, and just make sure that, like I said, I mean that all of us around are okay. First. I think we all probably feel that way. Likely I probably won’t sleep Nikki and I to be okay first before self. And I feel like, you know, okay. Yeah. Thank you so much.

Joe: That was supposed to be a softball. Let’s take a little water break here. So we’re here in the Colorado. Did you grow up in Colorado? Did you grow up somewhere else? How did you navigate to this area?

GMB: Well, we were born, born in grand junction, Colorado, and our dad moved us to small town, Nebraska where we all grew up, did most of our growing years there anyways. And then one by one, we just started moving out here, his five kids in the family, and we all now live out here and our parents live out here. And then the F the way we all got to Colorado Springs was followed Nikki and a dream that she had and a vision. So that’s how we all the sisters anyways, that’s how we got here to Colorado Springs to start, start a farm.

Joe: Were there any memories in grand junction or Nebraska when Nebraska sounds like there would be, was there a farm involved there? Is that, what was your memories? What your first experiences working in the garden, working in a farm, those types of things. If you had that,

GMB: We didn’t not grow up with a farm. Yeah. We grew up in a small town, lots of farming around it, but no, you know, it wasn’t like the backyard gardening kind of place. It was large, you know, scale farms. Yeah. And our family lived in town and we didn’t, we know, we always had a love of nature. We grew up outside literally outside all day, every day, but we didn’t have, you know, the farming and, and flowers were not part of our lives at all.

Joe: So that came later in life.

GMB: That adult came about six months ago.

Joe: Yeah. Yeah. That’s so interesting. I mean, I can, my wife grew up, her family had like a back garden that was pretty, pretty large and didn’t grow up on a farm or anything, but, so she got really attached to gardening at that age and then has introduced our son to gardening back, especially back when I lived in Indiana, harder out here, especially where we live with the deer. And a lot of stuff just doesn’t grow very long, but so that’s where her connection to guardian what was started and continued on. But it’s interesting that it kind of starts later in life. Can you talk, obviously I wanted to explore your story and how we, how, why we’re even here together, as you indicated, Abby, you know, we’re here through your story. Can you walk through that? And certainly you share it on the website, but I’d love to hear from just for your own perspective.

GMB: Yeah, yeah. So this is Nikki talking and my background is not in flowers at all, but my background is in nonprofit management and accounting, you know, so since graduating from college all the way until about two years ago, that was every, that was my life and thought that would always be my life. And I loved the work that I was doing. And, and unfortunately I had a concussion. It actually came from working in my garden. I’ve always just kind of loved, you know, working in my planning, my own little flowers and things in the yard.

So I was working in my garden and I stood up too fast and I got dizzy and I ended up fainting. And when I think did I hit my head, but I didn’t realize it and kind of went about life as if nothing had happened and things just got worse and worse and worse, but I kind of put up with that for about a year. And then I had to quit my job because things just, I was getting really awful migraines. My vision was, it was just really difficult to use the computer with my vision. So it just had all of these really awful concussion symptoms that took me out of work. And alongside that I had a nerve injury and the back of my head it’s called the occipital nerve and it was related to the injury.

Yeah. So it all happened at the same time. It’s basically like whiplash. And so it stretched the nerves and cause damage. And that created like excruciating pain for months on end. And it got so bad that I, like I had to just sit in a dark room with my eyes closed for 24 hours a day for about eight months straight. And finally, and we didn’t know it was a nerve injury at that point. So finally found a surgeon who could do the surgery on the nerve and from the surgery until finding the flowers. I spent a lot of time just contemplating my life, but I had gone through what I was given with getting my life back.

And during all of this, my husband had been bringing me flowers and it was just one of the, probably the, probably the only bright spot in my life at that point in time, mean it was a difficult time and it was just such a symbol of love. That’s all. It was, it was like the most beautiful symbol of love and it sparks something. And me, you know, so unexpected, I never thought I would have a life in flowers and it just sparked something. And I start, I found this flower farming online course with Florette and it’s a farm in Washington state and went through that course and started growing flowers in my backyard last year and just had like a small backyard cutting garden.

And Leah and Abby gotten involved at that point because we were hunkering down for COVID. We all did quarantine together and they were helping me just get my backyard garden set up and really helped, like establish, help me just follow the dream that was growing from this, this vision of flowers and sharing the love and joy with others. So that’s where the spark of the idea came from. It just lit me up in a way I never thought it would. And then, you know, never thought I’d have this life. That’s interesting.

Joe: And were you already back, did COVID bring you back or was it winter brought you back to, to Colorado Springs? Had you already moved back here? The timeline?

GMB: No, we like, I moved back here, Abby and I moved to Colorado Springs in January. So when we were in lockdown with Nikki, I was in Denver. So I just came and lived with Nikki for a few weeks. Same with Abby. She came out to California to live with us. Bless Nikki’s husband And all of this.

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Joe: Talk a little bit more about that process of receiving flowers, enjoying growing flowers, but then the act of like, somebody else needs to experience this too. How did it get to that point? How did you, what was the thought process there? Can you take me through that?

GMB: I think that’s where my sisters came in because I knew that there was, there was something to sharing flowers. You know, there, there is something where flowers are beautiful by themselves, but really what they’re representing is an act of love. You know, they’re there for death and sickness and they’re there for marriage and, you know, celebration. So they’re there for all of those emotions. But what really, I think brought the three of us together was that we, we care so deeply about the community around flowers and the community that it creates and the experiences that can be had.

And that’s how we, you know, we just started talking and that’s what clicked for us is we knew we wanted to create a space that allowed people in and allowed those experiences and those emotions to be felt. So it was, it was the, you know, it started with my husband, but the only way that I could expand it was with the, the sisters that I have and what we were able to do together because we just, I mean, our hearts were just drawn to that and like the most powerful way, that’s what we were drawn to.

Joe: Yeah. I’d love to hear your two stories on how you were pulled into that story as well. Cause you have your personal connection with husband bringing flowers, and that means so much to you. And of course you’ve probably experienced that from, from the outside, but what were your, how were you pulled into the story so much so that you wanted to be a part of the creation totally uprooted our lives.

GMB: This is Abby speaking. And I know for me, quarantine happened, like we were all saying hunkered down together and pretty much just tore Nike’s backyard up in that time. Me personally, I didn’t, I was just doing an activity with my sisters. That’s what it was for, for me. And then as you know, I would, so I’d FaceTime with Nikki. She’s like, look at all these flowers growing. I was like, whoa, but it’s still, I don’t think it connected with me until I think the farm was set in stone because that again was a idea, you know?

And then when that was locked in and therefore a little bit, I was, I just couldn’t fathom my me leaving my life in California because I had a pretty amazing life in California. And, and then as time went, I don’t know, something inside started to happen. And the more talking with Nikki and Leah and it was becoming more real.

I just couldn’t stop thinking about starting a farm with my sisters and just knowing the magic that that was going to bring. And I just couldn’t stop thinking about waking up to a farm full of flowers that we personally grew and to be able to create community through flowers, I don’t know, something just clicked. And I was like, there’s absolutely nowhere else that I want to be in life. And there’s nothing else that I’d be, I’d rather be doing. And so, and that’s, that was really it for me.

And then coming out here and, you know, just diving head first into this whole adventure. And I feel like the more and more it goes on, the more and more I personally feel connected to not only my sisters, but the community and, you know, the beauty of it all is that it is all through flowers, you know, because it does create something super special for sure. So, well, I would say like after, after we stayed with Nikki and, and you know, we started her garden and we left and Nikki stayed and just create all these flowers, like all of these flowers.

And it was the first time for me to really see something come up straight from the earth, from a tiny seed into these big, beautiful flowers. And I was in a phase in my life where, so I’m a hairstylist for 21 years. I’ve loved it, hands down, loved it. But I knew that there was something more for me that I wanted to do to transition into. Like I knew my career as a hairstylist was starting to end. I just didn’t know how and Nikki would bring me buckets of flowers and I would start creating arrangements with these flowers and I would give them to people. And that’s when, like, it struck me of like the joy of giving the joy of flowers and then Nikki calls.

And she said she got far. I knew things were going to get real and we would start daydreaming and about ideas for the farm. And that’s when I asked the, started to know that there’s something there for all of us to create. That’s bigger than us. That’s bigger. Then we just knew it was bigger than us. And we knew that we couldn’t do anything without each other. It was also a place where like, sort of say now Abby and I are sober.

So it was like a place where I knew I could be like the best version of me by growing and doing this with my sisters and giving back to the community. And if it wasn’t for this farm, like we wouldn’t be here the way we are today. So yeah, there was just a deep, deep knowing that this is exactly what we had to do. Yeah. So it’s flowers.

Joe: That’s beautiful. Well, it’s beautiful because you want so much to bring the community involved and, and not just have good flowers. Right. You could just, you can, anybody could probably just find the right techniques, but it’s like your hard work and really what you just said there, your, your personal stories that you’re putting into the soil. And of course you’re receiving so much every time you get your hands dirty and you’re turning things over, but you’re also putting parts of your own lives into that, which therefore somebody can take with them more than just a balloon, right? It’s like, it’s your story that they’re taking, whether they know it or not just that the energy of the experience is really awesome. Talk a little bit about, like, I know it’s a little early, but what sort of experiences come to mind when you think about how you have engaged with the community? What are some ways that they’ve been received from, from this garden? Any personal stories that come to mind?

GMB: Yeah, there’s a lot. I mean, every day it feels like a new story. And when we say the farm, maybe we should just explain real quick. Yeah. We’re at Venetucci farm. So we’re gathered mountain balloons as our flower farm, and we’re leasing the Venetucci farm, which is a historic farm in this community. And, you know, one, we hear stories from almost everybody who comes to visit about their memories coming here. And Nick and Bambi Venetucci were the ones who really started the vision of community in this space. And they would give pumpkin’s to kids. And so many people have the memory of coming to the farm for pumpkins.

So we get to in a really special way, continue a legacy of giving and community and our own way with flowers. But it definitely started with just some wonderful people before us. Yeah. So, you know, we’re here at Venetucci farm. So, but since we’ve been here, I’ll say for me, I really just personal side to what the farm gives is that I’ve been able to bring some other people who have ongoing struggles with their own concussion symptoms. You know, concussions are so complex and a lot of people have experienced one and gotten better, but a lot of people don’t and you know, those handful of people that really struggle through life for a long time.

Yeah. I’m still in that category. I still struggle a lot myself, but you know, with a concussion, sometimes you just need to be in a space that feels at peace with nature, surrounded by people who understand what you’re going through. So, you know, I’ve had a opportunity to bring some people out here and give them something really special through that. And that means a lot to me because they’re giving me a lot too when they’re here. So those are really, those are special things that we get to do with the farm for me. Yeah.

I’ll try. I think, you know, as you see us crying through this. Yeah. So it, this farm has been such a healing place for us personally. And then as Nikki said, so many others come in for it to be a healing place for them. And I just know a personal story of what I experienced, because I mean, there’s times that people come and just share their story in tears.

We’re just so much gratitude that the farm is back to life. And it was two weekends ago. I believe during our, you are Saturday, you picked days, the community comes out and they can cut their own flowers. And I’m, I’m down at the pig deal, just helping everyone out. And this woman with her granddaughter afterwards just came over and I’m in tears. And that’s like the most beautiful thing in my opinion. And she’s like, all that I can say is, thank you. She’s like, thank you.

She’s like, I don’t live in state. And I was just able to create one of the most beautiful memories with my granddaughter. And so it’s stuff like that. And it’s just amazing, you know, because we do, I mean, we’re pouring our hearts and soul into this because we’re so deeply just invested, you know? And yeah. There’s just something about sharing this farm with everyone else.

Joe: So you guys, there seems to be a great camaraderie. I don’t think it’s fake. I feel like it’s all fairly legit. I know. I couldn’t, I don’t know. I love my siblings, but it’s hard for me to imagine doing a business with them. Was that a hard transition? Was there a lot of, was there some hesitation with any of you? Like, I don’t know if we can make this work or has it, was it just like, of course, like, let’s just do this.

GMB: It was, it was like, of course let’s just do this. I don’t think any of us were afraid of doing business with each other. We’ve always been so close as sisters forever. And I think because we all bring something so different to the table to keep things going here, there’s no stepping on each other’s toes. There’s no, like I can’t do Abby’s job better. And Nikki can’t, I can’t do Nikki’s job better. And it goes down the line like that. So we have a lot of trust in each other, just knowing that we’re all gonna pull the same weight and we’re all gonna like bring the same thing to the table.

We’re all gonna put our heart and soul into it. And so, no, I don’t know. Absolutely. I mean, all business advice would have told us, you should, you should really be careful, but we, I think it’s, I mean, we keep talking about this, like being drawn by our hearts, but we were just so drawn in by that. It just did it seriously fuels what we do. Yeah. And then we have those different skills and we couldn’t do this without, like, if one of us was missing this whole thing when works. I mean, it really, really does just work that way.

Joe: Were you, did you ever try to bring the two brothers in or was that never part of the conversation?

GMB: Nope. No, they’re good. They’re good to love our brothers. They’re in a different phase of their lives.

Joe: It started in 2020, correct? Officially. So, I mean, that’s definitely an interesting year to start a business. What was sort of like, I don’t care. What’s sort of going on in the world right now. This is the time to do we have to do it now. Kind of walk me through that. Like just that push to endure the realities of the world and just saying this let’s not wait, let’s just go ahead and pursue this now.

GMB: Well, it started whether I liked it or not, when it, it was just like, cause I had, you know, I was coming out of like my cocoon of a world. So in, you know, when COVID hit, I was like, I’ve been doing this for like a year and a half. Right. You know, quarantine, that’s what I’ve been doing. So when I came out of like my health coma essentially, and I wasn’t in a college when I kind of came out of my stuff, I was just, I just knew that it was time to start. You know, it didn’t matter what was going on in the world.

And the nice thing is that I was starting slowly. I wasn’t starting with like, you know, this is going to be a huge farm with lots of people and flowers I literally was growing. And like, I don’t know what 10th of an acre or something like tiny little backyard space and joined up with a collectic, which is another incredible company that has a little boutique and old car city and downtown Colorado Springs and would just pop up outside their shop with flowers. I mean, it stared that simple and you know, people were kind of dying to have flowers in their lives at that point too, just with, I think needing that beauty with everybody being kind of shut up for so long.

Yeah. So it just happened because that’s when it needed to happen, you know? And like the COVID world was its own thing.

Joe: Just a couple more questions. I know you’re still early on into this entrepreneurial game. What are some maybe early lessons you would be able to share with maybe some mistakes you’ve learned along the way, some challenges you faced, any sort of tips, tricks that you would give to other business owners?

GMB: Well, we’re all kind of smiling to each other because, and I think the biggest lesson is to try to just go to just try it. I think we went into all of this in the beginning, knowing for certain that we would fail at some things we’ve also gone in without the idea of perfection and getting that right. And we’ve also gone in with the idea of having fun. Like this is having fun is definitely something that we try to always be reminded of. But that’s what I can add to it.

I don’t know if, yeah. I was just gonna say our, our famous saying around here, because it is, we don’t know everything and we don’t try to know everything and we do do everything about two to three times, you know? And do I personally wish it wasn’t like that? Do I wish that, you know, we could just do it right the first time. Yeah. Yeah. But you know, I mean it’s the first year and we also are okay with clunking through the smooth or yeah. That’s our, it’s our word for how we’re about business. We just talk through it. Yeah. It’s first. Year. I mean, it’s a bunch of lessons and it’s a bunch of learning and like Leah was saying just, don’t be afraid, you know, these opportunities and ideas keep rising. And for whatever reason, we’re always like, let’s do it. Yeah. We, we guess we’re like, if you think yet it will happen around. Yeah. Because literally it’s like, we will say one day, like we should have live music on the farm. And then the next day we’re like, we just looked at but things just flow real naturally to us when the time’s right. When we kind of go with it, we figure it out, figure it out as we go. We have no idea what we’re doing, no idea what it is. It’s just like not being afraid to fail. And I, you know, it might look a little different if we didn’t have each other, you know, if you know, Nikki got this, she was doing it alone. I’m sure. Oh my gosh, definitely. So I think just knowing that we all have each other’s backs and you know, if we fail, we’re all going to be okay. Yeah.

Joe: Well, it’s nice that you can all speak into each other and you’re not going in alone. And then you second guessing yourself, are you able to sort of throw in any need out, you’ll get some pushback or get some confirmation of it and you can go through life that way. Which is great. Know, I think, I mean, I’ve been doing this almost 10 years and what you said there about, you know, just being okay with making mistakes and not being perfectionistic about it. I mean, I’m still struggling with that. And I just had a pretty vulnerable newsletter that we just put out and just talked about how that’s still a struggle for me to just be so hard on myself when there’s mistakes wasn’t even a business related. It was like painting. It was like a bad painting job. It had nothing, it was so like easily cleaned up. And I just realized my wife is helpful to be able to clarify like how hard I was being on myself. I’m sure. Like, that was just the words that exited my mouth. Not all of the other words that are going on to Saba, but it’s the love, that’s good encouragement for me to be kinder to myself through the mistakes and not be so hard. So I appreciate you sharing that.

One more question, just on the act of gathering flowers, you know, like what, what do you think that means? Like why do you think that is so such a powerful act in somebodies life? What does that give to them even different than planting a seed or watching it grow? Just the act, the final act of sort of gathering the flower, which is in your name, sort of like, what does that, how would you characterize that?

GMB: Pure joy? Hmm. Hmm. I just think I would like when you were asking that, I just think of the volunteers that do come out and to see them just so happy to be cutting a flower and going through. And I know that that’s how, when all the flowers started blooming, I was blown away. Absolutely blown away by each flower that was coming up because mind you, I had never, ever grown a flower. And anyways, so there is just something like almost the innocence of like people’s reaction to the beauty and just the life of a flower. Yeah. It’s pretty amazing.

Well, you know, when, cause I, I started gathering mountain blooms as the business, before these two joined and I intentionally called it gather mountain influence and it was just going to be gathered because it, to me it’s about it. Like we said, the flowers are the means by which we can gather together and gather around, you know, whether it’s a celebration or just handing off a hand, gathered bouquet of flowers, you know, it’s, there’s something really incredible about the gathering of, of people in a space with the emotion that can go behind that. So it’s the word gather was very intentional in the naming of the business for sure.

Oh gosh. There’s so many things that I feel like it means, but it just feels like a flower is lets you pause. Like that’s what I love. So before you gather that flower, you’re going to stop and just really enjoy the beauty of it. I can’t think of anything else that allows you to pause and enjoy looking at that flower. So I love the, the brief moment that it gives you when you pick a flower, when you gather flowers and then the joy that you get to receive from those flowers, whether it’s, you know, for yourself or whether it’s for giving them to somebody else. I just feel like a flower is so intentional in a person’s life. You just don’t really know how much it does for you until you really stop and think about the beauty of that flower and what that flower smells like and who you’re going to give it to. It’s just so beautiful in that way.

Joe: Certainly engages all the senses.Yeah. Well, thanks so much for your sharing your stories. This is a bit so, so empowering to me and I can’t wait for people to come out here and enjoy your space. So thank you.

GMB: Thank you so much.

Shannon: You’ve been listening to the Metaphorically Speaking podcast. At Keyhole Marketing, we tell big stories for small businesses. If you’re in the Colorado Springs area and ready to tell your business story, we’d love to come alongside you and help you with your content, branding, SEO, social media, or photography needs. For an instant glimpse at your current marketing strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities, take our free marketing assessment, or send us an email at hi@keyholemarketing.us and let us know how we can help tell your story.