Call Paul

Season 2 – Call Paul – Spotlight

Paul: Hey there, I’m Paul Jarvis. In this season of Call Paul we’re doing something a little different -- in between thoughtful conversations with business owners, we’re sharing spotlights like this one, of small businesses we really believe in. We hope you’ll enjoy this behind the scenes peek at the day to day of running a company and, if you’re picking up what they’re putting down, maybe you’ll consider supporting them too.

Joey: Wow ok Joey here. Joey Cafone from Baronfig. Testing the microphone

Paul: In this small business spotlight we hear from Baronfig, which makes tools for thinkers like notebooks and pens.

Joey: Sorry my chair is a little… here are some sounds from my chair (chair squeaking)

Yeah.

(music)

I'm in Illinois or my in-laws, I've been here since October 31st Halloween because of COVID-19. We left our New York city apartment. And we drove out here with our then 12 week old puppy Luigi. Really enjoying the space. We’re in the basement, which is a finished basement I’ve got a desk in the corner . It’s also where we sleep there's a bed here aaand it reminds me of our studio apartment, because I can do almost everything in this one room. I work in here. I sleep in here I watch Netflix in here , I read in here, I write in here. So I like that. I like small spaces actually.

Going upstairs to Luigi and my mother in law chilling.

Hello.

Would you like to say hello to the people of Mailchimp in Atlanta? It’s a recording.

Mother-in-law: Oh well hello , so nice to have you, with little Luigi, who is going to eat the mic I think. (Dog nose sounds)

Joey: There he is. Ok. good boy

Oh speaking of sound I picked up the trumpet umm when I think I turned 32. So here the trumpet I’ll play a little, I’m not very good.

(dog howling )

Joey: I know. You are on the recording I gave you a chance. Ok I picked up the trumpet. Why? Because I realized after turning 30 or when I turned 30 wow as adults we kind of get really good at the things we do and then most of us don’t pick up new things. So, I picked up the new thing and it’s really refreshing to suck at it, because it reminds me of what I’m good at and it also helps me kind of learn how to learn again kind of keep learning.

Okay, I’m going to play like two seconds of the trumpet. Ok here I go.

(trumpet playing)

Alright let’s answer some of these questions. Shall we. How do you define yourself? Oh man, I don’t think I do. I don’t actually. I do define the business. Business is Baronfig. Baronfig dot com. Business is defined as: we make tools for thinkers. We make notebooks, pens, pencils, all sorts of things that help people brainstorm and think and ideate and even plan and be productive. We could refer to me as, oh Joey does play the trumpet or Joey does design, but I don't like the idea of like Joey is a designer because I wouldn’t say that would be really it and I’m definitely not a trumpet player. I wonder, I would love to hear other people's answers to, how do you define yourself?

(music)

So we have this thing called Friday 15 where every week we are paired with a random person at Baronfig and you spend 15 minutes talking about anything but work. So today I happen to be talking to Jay. And let’s see, hello Jay.

Jay: Hello Joey.

Joey: How’s it going? Oooh good news. Interesting news. As of this past Monday. We hired the 9th person and as of next Monday we are hiring the 10th person. Which number one, cool . Never had the dream to run a team. Manage a team. Manage anyone, that's not what I was in this for and it’s actually like the bummer about it, however it’s a responsibility I take seriously.

But anyway we have 10 people and because of COVID and quarantine, almost half now as of next Monday, will have never been in the same room and I never thought that I would say that. Or be in that situation, because for the longest time I was anti-remote work. And not, for the reasons you may initially think, like ‘low productivity’ or people slacking off or not doing their work or whatever, but no. I like in person work and emphasize it so strongly because I believe it’s the best way to be creative and we do creative work probably like 70-80% of the time at Baronfig between limited editions and marketing and all sorts of cool products that we’re trying to make, and the team is always being consulted and brought into the process and it’s a lot of just like passing things around and having like the same conversation five times in a day at the whiteboard and at the water – there’s my father in law – but when we went remote we decided to ask ourselves, you know do we want to keep up this anti remote sentiment , or do we just embrace it and say how can we be the best that we can be at it.

(music)

Joey: Whats that sound? The sound of a heater, keeping Ariana warm. Let’s see if she’ll be nice or she’ll be mean. Ready? Hello

Ariana: Oh (laughs) hi

Joey: Why are you eyeballing the mic?

Ariana: Because you are in motion, and you got holes in your pants and stains on your shirt. I think you need an outfit change.

Joey: I don’t think the microphone can pick up any of that

Ariana: I think that’s a (sings) liee

Joey: (sings) Laalalla la

Joey: Do you want to give a little bit of ‘Frozen?’

Ariana: (sings) Do you want to build a snowman? Cmon lets go and play. How's that?

Joey: That was really good. You sing the song very good . What’s your name?

Ariana: My name is Ariana Cafone. I am married to Joey Cafone. And yes I am surviving.

Joey: Would you like to tell them anything, any advice you’ve been given recently thats been useful?

Ariana: In life or something specific?

Joey: Anything. A-N-Y-T-H-I-N-G

Ariana: Ummm advice. I don’t know I mean, slow down. The main piece of advice that I’ve gotten that I think is helping me is just slowwwing down in life. We move so fast and we miss a lot because we are moving so fast .

Joey: Why is it important to slow down ?

Ariana: Because I think you can be more intentional in your actions instead of getting swept up into something you can let go and start to focus more on what you are doing.

Joey: Do you think that faster is better?

Ariana: I used to I don’t anymore

Joey: Why?

Ariana: Because some things need to be fast and some things need to be slow. There’s room for it all.

Joey: I agree

(dog noises)

Ariana: All right. Signing out Byee.

Joey: He just ran into the chair

Paul: Many thanks to Joey for sharing his story. For more check out baronfig.com I’m Paul Jarvis and you’re listening to Call Paul, a Mailchimp original podcast. You can check out more episodes of the show on your favourite podcast player.