Show Notes:

Ever wondered how resilience and adaptability can help you reinvent yourself? Meet Dan Bigger, a man who has successfully navigated various career pivots, personal trials, and life changes. His journey is an inspiring tale of resilience that casts light on the emotional and physical tolls of job loss and moving, and the significance of effective communication during such transitions.

Dan's story is not just about career twists and turns but also about honesty, authenticity, and the importance of staying true to oneself. His experiences have taught him to reassess his relationships and manage time more productively and intentionally - lessons that he's eager to pass on. Plus, hear how he transitioned to working alongside his wife in their joint business, Glimmerglass Gifts, and the balance of strengths that make their venture successful.

Finally, we unpack the concept of calculated risks involved in reinvention and the necessity of a backup plan. Dan's insights into taking early life risks and maintaining a carefree attitude offer a unique perspective and a wealth of wisdom for anyone considering a career change or personal reinvention. This episode is a treasure trove of valuable insights on life changes, career transitions, and personal growth. Get ready to be inspired by Dan's tale of resilience and reinvention!

Host: Julie Basello, Basello Media
Email: juliebasello@gmail.com
Website: http://www.juliebasello.com

Guest: Dan Bigger, Glimmer Glass Gifts
Contact Dan Bigger on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-bigger/
Visit Glimmer Glass Gifts Online: https://www.glimmerglassgifts.com/

Transcript:

Julie Basello

Have you ever wanted to start over to reinvent yourself? Reinvention is something we all do at some point in our lives. Sometimes it's simple, sometimes it's complicated, but it's often necessary to lead a fulfilling life, and it's always interesting. I'm your host, julie Bassello. Join me for some inspiration as I share reinvention stories, tips and tricks from real people just like you. Let's explore reinvention adventures together.

Episode of Reinvention Adventures. In today's episode, we're speaking to a person who has reinvented himself too many times to count. Dan Bigger is a stable family man, happily married with four amazing kids. However, his career has been an interesting journey with lots of twists and turns. He's had to reinvent himself in different situations time and time again. He brings a ton of sales skills to the table, but has often found himself in situations that were less than supportive of his efforts and experience. As a result, he's become the master of pivoting, and his most recent pivot landed him someplace where he's definitely appreciated, right in the middle of his wife's small business, glimmer Glass Gifts. Glimmer Glass Gifts creates artists and glass pieces inspired by nature, and Dan is now assisting the artist, his wife Julie, with all kinds of job tasks in an effort to help their family business grow. He has a ton of interesting stories and he's going to share some of his important lessons from his reinvention journeys. I'm really looking forward to hearing what he has to say, and I bet you are too.

Before we begin, this podcast is sponsored by Bicello Media. Bicello Media is my content creation company that supports small businesses with their content needs. Things like websites, social media and podcasting all require content, and Bicello Media can help your small business navigate the process. We also edit and produce podcasts for small businesses. If you find yourself short on content or want to reinvent yourself with a new podcast for your brand, let's talk. For more information, visit juliebicellocom. And now let's dive right in with Dan Bigger. Dan, welcome to Reinvention Adventures.

Dan Bigger

Hey, it's. Julie. Thanks for having me.

Julie Basello

Smarty Dan and I are not strangers and we've definitely interacted from a networking standpoint, first and then as friends. For what a couple of years now, right?

Dan Bigger

Yeah, that's probably going on three.

Julie Basello

Yeah, at least, at least Dan is someone that I got to know online, believe it or not, and then we've actually met in person, had dinner with some other people that we networked with. So Dan and I are not strangers and I know a lot about Dan's stories and I'm really looking forward to him sharing some of those lessons that he's learned. So let's begin with a bit about your career background. How did you first get into sales and what made you know that that was what you wanted to do?

Dan Bigger

To be honest with you, I had career goals as I was coming up, things I wanted to try out and things I wanted to do. But I tried a lot of different things and when I found something that I thought I wanted to do, that there was obstacles in my way that I either couldn't do or didn't want to do. Then I just moved on to something else. So I sort of got into sales almost by accident.

Julie Basello

To be honest with you, Interesting, so it wasn't a choice then. It wasn't like you had in your mind that you were good at selling things, or somebody told you you were good at selling things and you decided you were going to do it. You just kind of fell into it.

Dan Bigger

No kind of yeah. So I went to college, and when I went to college, of course, growing up, I wanted to be a baseball player, and that was actually a possibility.

Julie Basello

That was actually a possibility. Oh, that's cool, I didn't know that.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, but at a certain point it got to be that I was just playing too much. I was playing all the time, even in the Northeast, almost year round. Right, I got burned out on it. So I just went another direction and I went with football. But when I went to college I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up. I'm 47 years old. I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up.

Julie Basello

I'm older than you and I still don't know either.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, I'm just being honest with you, I sort of have. I've seen pictures on LinkedIn where they have the career path, where it's a zigzag line all over the place, and that's really what mine is.

Julie Basello

Mine too, but you know what? Who says that there's any age where you have to know what you want to be when you grow up? I like to think that we can evolve as we go and we learn new things as we're living and we gain new interests as we're going through life, and why can't we explore those? Why does it have to be a straight line?

Dan Bigger

It doesn't it doesn't, but it's much easier Of course I sort of tell that to my kids, because everything I've done in my career I sort of try to train them and teach them on the things where I screwed up. So I'm trying to get my kids earlier to understand that if they have a career direction and start following a straight line, that may veer off, but if you stay in the same industry or the same profession, everything you're doing you're building a foundation that you can keep building on. Where mine has just gone all over the place and in most cases I've had to start over, which again, is fine with me. But I'm not willing or I'm not unwilling to learn new things. I'm not willing to jump into the deep end of the pool and learn how to swim, because I've really done that my entire career.

Julie Basello

Right and you don't want your kids to suffer from things the way you did. Understood on that.

Dan Bigger

But at the same point is it suffering, though? No, I don't want to say it's suffering, but let's just take a couple of my career changes when I went from injection molding plastics to extrusion plastics. I mean same general principle ideas, but they're whole different industries. So now everything that you knew or were learning and all the connections and companies that you're working with now you have to go build all that up again and that's basically what I've done. Every time I go I'm building a whole new everything and basically starting a scratch.

Julie Basello

I have to tell you, though, I don't know if easy is always best and I say that, you know, with all due respect to you and wanting your kids to have an easier time. I understand that for sure, but easy sometimes easy isn't. If you choose well and it's fulfilling to you, then absolutely going in a straight line can be good and much easier. But I don't know. I mean, I started out in a straight line and then I zigzagged, and the zigzags were where things got interesting. The straight line was okay and I was successful on paper, but I don't know that that was the kind of success that I wanted. You know what I mean.

Dan Bigger

No, I totally understand what you mean and I enjoy.

Julie Basello

I enjoy the work of it.

Dan Bigger

You know I enjoy the journey. I enjoy doing things that I don't have any idea what I'm doing when I start. You know, I call myself a half-ass marketer because I don't have the training and experience that some of our colleagues have. But I wanted to dive into the deep end of the pool and just figure it out.

Julie Basello

Half the world is a half-ass marketer, just so you know. Yeah, right, it works for you. Yeah, and nothing in life is easy.

Dan Bigger

Everything's, you know, a process. You got to learn and learn and learn, Right, you know? I guess the key to it is if you have a general outline plan that you can sort of follow. It's a lot easier than starting over all the time.

Julie Basello

It sure is, it sure is. However, when the opportunity arises to start over, when you've prepared yourself and you have some experience with starting over, it is definitely a little bit easier, wouldn't you say? That is correct. I mean, you and I, we hit a zigzag line and we're like okay, here's what we need to do. You know, we've kind of got a game plan in our heads of, okay, we've got to try this, we've got to do that, we've got to think this way. But there's some people who have only done the straight line and then they reach a point in their lives where they need to zig or zag, and it's a struggle, for sure, even though they know they need it or they know they want it. It's scary.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, Everything is better with experience. I mean the more experience you have, you know, the easier it is to do whatever it is, because you've been there, done that, you know and, like I said, I have literally started over so many times that it's not a big deal for me because I have a generalized plan in my head of what I need to do, what I need to figure out first and then where I'm going, because I mean I can iron out a plan for a new job in a couple of hours day maybe.

Julie Basello

And that is why you're here, Because you bring a lot to the table and the listeners that listen individually. Each person who's got their ears on this has something to gain from all of those zigs and zags.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, it's all teachable moments.

Julie Basello

It is all teachable moments. For sure. If you do it right, I think it's all teachable moments and it doesn't evolve into a crisis.

Dan Bigger

Well, even if you do it wrong, you're still learning something. I mean, I've learned a tremendous amount, that's true, I'm not the same person. I was 10, 15 years ago a year ago.

Julie Basello

Really, yeah, that's true. So what's one thing you would consider an important career reinvention lesson from what you've experienced, let's say information?

Dan Bigger

And I say that because the more information you have about going into a certain situation, that easier again.

Julie Basello

I'm using it a lot easier, but that's okay, we don't mind that word too much.

Dan Bigger

The transition becomes less complicated. So when you're going in and you have a generalized idea of what the job entails, what you're going to be doing on a day-to-day basis, who you're going to be working for, the team you're going to be working with, I mean all that stuff plays a huge part in your success, and not only your success but the team's success. So that's one thing I've really tried to emphasize. Now, when I make a career switch is what exactly am I getting into? And I'm not afraid to ask questions that, frankly, some employers don't like because they don't want to give you the full view. I mean, when you go into a job interview, I think in some cases probably most cases it's half-truths. I mean, the interviewer is giving half-truths about what they've done, what they've accomplished, and the employer is doing the same, because they don't want to.

It's like a first date. They don't want to give you all the gory details of what actually goes on in a place, so you sort of have to uncover that on your own, and the more information you have can help you avoid obstacles later.

Julie Basello

Right, that's unfortunate too that it's like that, but it is often like that. Everybody's selling somebody something, a bill of goods, so to speak.

Dan Bigger

Right, well, and that's where I don't do that. In any case, I go into every opportunity and every interview that I have and I'm me, I ask questions, I ask a lot of questions, I ask so many questions. My interviews usually run a half an hour long, if not longer. Right Right, because I've gotten into situations where I didn't have all the information going in, even into family businesses. I had family members that I knew in the family business.

You didn't get all the information when you went in and as you started going along, you're like well, why is this happening? Why are they doing this? What's going on here? Who's making decisions? And it comes back to communication. Communication wasn't communicated to me in a fashion because the person that I was communicating with didn't know how to do it. They didn't know how to communicate as a leader. They didn't know how to prepare you for what you were getting into, what the long-term plan was, what the short-term plan was, what's the end goal? Where are we trying to go with this and all those things? What are the things I'm going to have to be doing? All those kind of things help you mentally prepare when you walk in the door, Instead of being the kid on first day of school figuring out as you're walking down the hall and you don't know anything, versus coming in with some assemblance of a plan.

Julie Basello

You mentioned communication and you mentioned job interviews being like a first date and really communication is everything everywhere, whether it is a first date or a job interview. In every facet of life, communication is going to make or break any situation and it's amazing to me how poorly so many people are at communicating.

Dan Bigger

I think they're afraid to be honest with you. I think people are afraid. People are afraid to be who they are.

Julie Basello

And I also think people are afraid in many instances to be honest and authentic and it takes some vulnerability to be able to be straight up and honest with people. But at the end of the day and I'm like you, as straight as I can be at the end of the day at least, if something doesn't work, you know that you were your authentic self.

Dan Bigger

Correct, yes.

Julie Basello

And I think that's important.

Dan Bigger

Well, and the life lesson that I learned that from was when my mother passed away. My mother passed away suddenly and at that point I really started evaluating all my relationships in my life, because I was doing all these things for all these people and I started noticing that when I needed stuff that these people weren't around and again and I don't keep score all the time- no, no, but sometimes it's blatantly obvious and you have no choice but to sit up and take notice, if you're really paying attention.

Right. So I started evaluating my life and what I was doing with my life and how I was spending my time, if my mother could pass away at the age of 56. Suddenly, life is short, you're only here for so long, so every ounce, every minute, I am here.

Julie Basello

I wanna be productive.

Dan Bigger

Even if it's productively, taking a day off to do something I wanna do or just relax. But everything I do has a purpose, everything I say has a purpose, like I don't waste a second of time in my life period.

Julie Basello

Well, I think that's amazing and very rare. Most of us are wasting some time. I mean, my addiction is TikTok.

Dan Bigger

I waste a lot of time on that, yeah, but that could be a relaxing, just sort of mind-numbing thing that just sort of clears your mind and like I walk on the beach and when I walk on the beach everything just goes quiet in my head, where I don't have 10,000 things, 10,000 ping pong balls going off of my head.

Julie Basello

I shouldn't say TikTok. So I do walk two to three miles every day, so there is that?

Dan Bigger

Oh, both are good.

Julie Basello

Yeah, a lot of times I will just put music on or I'll get on the phone and catch up on phone calls, or I'll just listen to a podcast something, but just out of my day job and out of my head, kind of just chilling out and physical activity both are very important.

Dan Bigger

It's because I am so time conscious. I spend a lot of time thinking and my mind very rarely shuts off or even quiet down.

Julie Basello

That's how creative people are too. I have a very tough time and my head is never quiet. My mind is never quiet either. I'm always doing something inside creating, thinking, planning and it's not just things that I have to do. Sometimes I'm actually creating something. Whether I realize it or not, I might be thinking of something that will turn into something else. It's always going. It's exhausting. To be honest with you, and I know you can relate even though you're not necessarily a creative the way that I'm describing. You have some of the same traits, and I'm sure your wife is like that too.

Dan Bigger

No well, yeah, and I probably. I never give myself as much credit as I maybe deserve, but I use my iPhone all the time. I'll be sitting at a volleyball game or something for my kids and then I deal, pop in my head and I'll start typing up an email to myself so I don't forget.

Julie Basello

Yeah, well, that's the bane of getting older you have these great ideas and then you either sleep through them or you forget them.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, I have a whole folder on my email that has just posts or ideas that I need to accomplish or things that I need to do.

Julie Basello

Do it all the time and I do the same thing send myself emails. Yeah, it's easy to search when you're searching for you. Yeah, so let's talk again about management, because we talked about how management tries to sell employees kind of a half truths, if you will. How do you think management plays a role in people's perception of success? Do you think that sometimes management impedes the perception of success or even impedes success? That's a great question.

Dan Bigger

I think management has its own idea of success and what they want to see, but in most cases those ideas are not drawn out of the head of the person that's giving them. So they have their idea of what you need to do and where you need to go, and they're not conveying it to you. So you're coming in with your own plan and your own ideas of what you think you need to do and again whether right or wrong.

I've gone rounds with managers and leaders and owners because either they didn't have the experience that I did and they were trying to tell me how to do my job, or they had more experience than I did, but it was antiquated and outdated. That's a struggle always.

Julie Basello

Yeah.

Dan Bigger

And I worked for one manager one time that thought that you still had to do in person and you tried to get indoors. Well, I did that because he told me to do that, but in some cases you'd walk into a room with a phone and you don't know who you're calling, so how?

Julie Basello

do you get into the door?

Dan Bigger

So again, there's drawbacks and setbacks, but again, doing some of those things that I didn't think were great ideas even at the time, I did them and I learned things from them and now I can just I can walk into a room and talk to anybody. You know, I was with my son a couple of months ago dropping him off at his friend's house, and down here everything's a gated community. So I walked in, you know, pulled up to the gate and I started talking to the security guard and we started having a conversation and my son's like how?

Julie Basello

do you do that and I'm like that's just what I do. I think that's just who you are as a person.

Dan Bigger

Well, it's fun to me. It's not even about me. It's about it's making a joke or you know, just getting them to laugh, you know.

Julie Basello

Finding a way to connect. That's what it is. It's finding a way to connect with other people, and there's always a way to connect with other people, Even the ones that don't want to connect. You can still somehow find a way if you're really paying attention.

Dan Bigger

One of my best stories was we were in a volleyball tournament, I think Columbia, south Carolina, and it was a break. So we went to Chick-fil-A me and my sons and we ordered and we were waiting in line and out comes this girl with an order. She's like are you Bob? I said no, but if I can be Bob, if you give me my food faster and she just lost it laughing. So again, it's just that's a dad joke, by the way. Hey, I don't care, I'm proud to be who I am.

Julie Basello

Did you get your food faster?

Dan Bigger

I didn't but everybody laughed.

Julie Basello

It's the little things, Dan it's the little things. I know the last year has been super challenging for you and your family and I know it's been challenging career-wise and personal-wise. And can you walk me through what that looked like and how it segway to Glimmerglass gifts?

Dan Bigger

Well, the last year has been just complete shock Last year. So that was 2022.

Julie Basello

Well, so 2021.

Dan Bigger

Let's go all the way back to then, so I was working in-.

Julie Basello

Remember, we only have about an hour and a half. No, it's gonna be quick. I'm just kidding, it's gonna be quick. So I was working up there for an injection molding company.

Dan Bigger

And all of a sudden my wife and I went to dinner and she said my son asked if we were about going to Heldon Head and my wife said we're moving to Heldon Head. Didn't ask me nothing, so I wasn't prepared for that. So, okay, we're moving to Heldon Head. So now she has her own business. She has everything. The kids will come down here to school I'm the only one that.

So now I'm trying to figure out my head. What's the plan? What if I don't get a job? How long is it gonna take me to get a job? What I will wanna do Can I work remotely? So all these things start popping in my head. And then all of a sudden I started networking and I had, I wanna say, four interviews in like two weeks and I got a job in under a month. Super exciting, that went, super easy, and I you know. So okay, now I get in this job I have. My territory is expanded from. You know, when I worked for that company in New York, he didn't really want me to leave New York, but I didn't do that, so I went across the United States. Now this new company allowed me to cold call and prospect North America. So now I could go into Canada, I can go into Mexico, and it was exciting because I had a bigger territory and more opportunity.

So then the CEO got fired and I want to say within three or four months, my boss and I lost our jobs, and I had never lost my job before. So it was a complete and total shock to me. I didn't know what to do, so I literally sat on my computer for about an hour. I went and told my wife that I lost my job and then after that I was posting.

I was posting connecting. I want to say I had an interview. I don't know how big my post got, but I ended up having an interview the next day. It wasn't something I wanted to pursue so I didn't pursue it. I ended up talking to a colleague of ours, John, and he had an opportunity. So I took that job and we was off and running again, but now my territory was the world. So now I was super excited. John and I were having conversations at 10 and 11 o'clock at night. I'd have an idea. I'd call him. I think we should do this. We would have like our two hour discussions and we were both super excited because we were both on the same page. And it was exciting to work with John because he wanted to go forward. I wanted to go forward. We were driving the train and we were all ports north.

Julie Basello

We discovered both with great energy levels and great drive both of you yeah.

Dan Bigger

And then we realized that we didn't control the train, that the train really had no conductor, and we were doing things that were not going to be supported. So now we had to find ways around that. So then come February of this year. So I left New York in June of 21, lost my job in January of 22, found a job in February of 22 and then lost my job again in February of 23.

Julie Basello

That's quite a roller coaster.

Dan Bigger

Yeah. So now I'm thinking, okay, I'm just going to redo everything I was going to do, and then the next day my father-in-law passed away. So yeah, so I lost my job one day. I sort of knew he was getting bad and sick. So when I had my separation meeting I'm like I just want to get this done. I don't want to prolong this so that to be honest with you, with losing my job and then him passing away, because he was like a father to me. To be honest with you, yeah, that's so sad.

Julie Basello

I'm sorry to hear that.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, it is what it is, I guess. But it threw me into a downward spiral which I didn't recover from for a while. It took me a month just to get my head right to the point where I could really just be on LinkedIn and actually looking for a job, and probably two to three months before my looking for a job was starting to become productive. Because I went into interviews and I just wasn't there mentally, I mean.

Julie Basello

I was out. Yeah, that's understandable. It's understandable, yeah, but given what your family was going through and what you had been through already, career-wise.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, it was a crazy time, you know, trying to help my mother-in-law, trying to help my wife. I'm looking for a job. Some days I'd lock myself in my office for hours, or at one point I locked myself in my office for three days and I just was looking for jobs and trying to talk to people. The market's just not there right now.

Julie Basello

Yeah, challenging for sure. How did that kind of transition to you working with Julie on Glimmerglass Gifts?

Dan Bigger

Well, my wife would come in because my office is right off of my bedroom, so she would come in and ask me questions and how's your day going? And blah, blah, blah. She works her home in her own studio and she could just see the frustration in my face and then how I was talking and, quite frankly, I was losing my mind and she's like well, why don't you just work for me? She's like I need help. I can't do all this stuff by myself. You can do things that I can't do.

And then I started sort of like testing it out. So I would look for a job in the morning and then, like noon, one o'clock, I'd go transition to work for her any afternoon. And I didn't know where this was going to go, because we had talked about this back in 2017, when I left her family business. And when I left her family business, I went to her and I told her all the things I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it, and she wasn't on board with it at the time. So now she's more receptive to it because she realizes how much help she needs and she realizes all the things that I can do, and she realizes that her weaknesses are my strengths and my weaknesses are her strengths and coming together as a team.

So till I really bought into, it took me about six months to mentally say okay, because the other thing about it having a family, we have two sets of twins, so that isn't cheap. No, they're constant. Yeah, they're constantly, constantly, constantly on the move. I mean, all my kids play so many sports and right now I go to about eight games a week.

Julie Basello

Between all of them and my wife who's coaching.

Dan Bigger

So, again, this is where my priorities, sort of my kids. I've been an integral part of my kids' lives. I've been, I've looked at what my father did, what my parents did and what her father did, and they weren't. My parents were involved, but not to the extent that I am. When I had kids, my kids were going to be my number one priority, and jobs are jobs and I appreciate that. But I'm willing to work as hard on my job as I am on my kids. But I want to see my kids grow up and I've already invested all this time into my kids and all their events.

I mean, I very rarely miss anything that they've ever done and I didn't want to lose that at this point. My daughters are seniors. I didn't want to take a job where they wouldn't allow me to be flexible and attend my daughters because this could be their last go around. I didn't want to miss the end of the story, right. So so when I looked at working with my wife, I saw a lot of possibility. I know that she wasn't able to keep up with the customers, I know she wasn't able to keep up with production and, frankly, I love my wife to death, but she is not the most organized person, and that's some of the things that I do like getting all our customers into a CRM, setting up a cadence to follow up with them, sending out emails to let them know of things that she wasn't communicating to them.

Julie Basello

Knowing what I know about working in with artists in the art business and I have both sides of the brain, I'm a creative but I'm also a business brain and seeing the two of you and how you've worked out this situation is amazing and I'm sure that Julie Bigger very much appreciates you doing what she isn't natural at doing the whole follow up piece, the whole business piece. It's not the fun part for a creative.

Dan Bigger

No.

Julie Basello

And, but it's necessary if you want to keep creating.

Dan Bigger

Well, and my wife, my wife is a, she is a, she is a, she is a, she is a, she is a. She doesn't really. I don't know what the word is, but you know, she is just, she doesn't see any obstacles.

Julie Basello

That's awesome. She doesn't see. That's what you want.

Dan Bigger

And I'm not the complete opposite, but I'm somewhere in the middle and saying well, you gotta consider this, you gotta think about this, like she just has. She comes up with an idea and she doesn't even think about anything, but go Like she's, you know so hey, I want you to swim the Atlantic and end up in England.

Julie Basello

Okay, go, and she's in the water and swimming and you're like, hey, wait a second, yeah, right, so I I appreciate that about her and I love her to death and and you know, but that's how she does everything Like.

Dan Bigger

last year she started a volleyball club. I mean, she's done it before, but now, between her business, the volleyball club and our kids, she is spread thin.

Julie Basello

You know what I used to say as a manager, though I'd rather rain someone in than have to pull them out.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, that's true.

Julie Basello

You know, it's better to have someone who's so action oriented and doing so much that maybe I need to rain them in a little so that I can help them get more efficient or be more productive with their time and their efforts. I would so much rather that person than someone who will not move and has to be pushed constantly. You can't survive that way. It won't. You won't move forward. That way. So you know what? At the end of the day, she's got all the right qualities to be successful doing what she's doing.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, but she needs me to balance out the planning because she doesn't plan anything. So, I look at things, I look at what you need to do. You know, and we've talked about a lot of different things lately, because now I'm not only helping her with Glimmerglass gifts, I'm helping her with her volleyball club, which is rising tide.

Julie Basello

Man, soon. Neither one of you is going to have time to do anything. We don't.

Dan Bigger

It's incredible, the only breaks we take are to attend our kids' games. That's about it.

Julie Basello

And that's not even a break. That's all part of the picture.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, we work seven days a week, you know, sometimes 12 hours a day, it's. You know. We are both of the same mindset and the fact that we will work and figure it out, and our communication is fantastic, which is better than it ever has been in our marriage. So, yeah, everything is going great.

Julie Basello

That's amazing. Back to that communication thing, so we talked about how that I mentioned. You know your ability to pivot at the beginning of this podcast. Glimmer glass gifts was the ultimate pivot.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, yeah, and and I say that because, well, a couple different things, a I didn't like having all of our eggs in one basket. You know, with the market the way it is, yeah, I was a little fearful of, you know, because I offset her. You know, she being the solopreneur and doing what she does. I had the steady job, the steady paycheck and the medical insurance right. And you know, I again, being a planner, I talked to a lot of different people and a lot of people Didn't think it was a good idea to go into business with my wife because it could destroy our marriage, which it certainly could. But, of course, and.

Julie Basello

But then any business can do that. It doesn't have to be a business that you're working together either.

Dan Bigger

Well, that's true, but you know, spending.

Julie Basello

All you know, I spend.

Dan Bigger

I don't spend all day with her, but you know, we divide up to the point where we we break up and do different things so we don't burn on top of each Other all the time. But yeah, again, it's a communication thing and, like you said, we communicate so well. Now, you know, she's receptive to my ideas, I'm receptive to her ideas. I've accepted that she's the boss and and that what she says goes. So she doesn't like one of my ideas, that's fine and and she's actually doing the same for me. So when I tell her things or things that I think we need to do, she's receptive to it. If she doesn't like it, she gives me honest feedback and that again, that's, you know, communication and honesty in any relationship.

Is really where it needs to be, so You're not wasting your time Going down paths that are just going to take you to somewhere where you don't want to be. You know what I mean.

Julie Basello

I do, and it's you know. When it comes to reinvention, the lesson that I'm hearing here is Communication at all facets of the process.

Dan Bigger

Communication is the most important thing in any relationship, in my opinion, you know, because, again, if one person is doing all the talking and one person doing all the listening, it's not a 50-50. You know, and that's how I look at every relationship, every relationship in my life has to be 50-50, or very, very close to it, or it's not. It's not a relationship.

Julie Basello

Right, and things go through ebbs and flows. There's going to be days where Julie may need 70, you may have 30 to give. There's. There's always ebbs and flows, but at the end of the day you're both working towards 50-50 right and, like I said, even you and I know.

Dan Bigger

You, you, when you need something and I'm there to help you. And I call you and I need something and you help me and that's, that's how absolutely.

Julie Basello

That's how, and there's.

Dan Bigger

There's no minced words. There's no.

Julie Basello

No, whether it's not with us.

Dan Bigger

We know each other so well that we're, you know, basically friends. So you know, you help me with my personal life, I'll help you with your personal life, there's sure.

Julie Basello

I mean that's what happens when you, when you open yourself up in an authentic way to different people in different, you know, in different facets of your life. I mean this was a networking Online interaction that, to me, has become one of my good friendships.

Dan Bigger

So it started from you joining us on Twitter and following my page and me Asking you if you needed help right from the get-go.

Julie Basello

That's how it all started right and you were a huge help to me. In fact you you changed the trajectory of some of what I was doing at the time. So this funny how you called yourself a half-ass marketer, but that's, I'm a full-time marketer and I learned a bit.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, but again sharing some information. How it goes. It's all about communication and sure, and you've been completely honest with me and I've been completely honest with you, so the the relationship continues to flourish as it should, and you branch off and I branch off and we bring other people in the fold, and that's really what it's supposed to be.

Julie Basello

Yeah no, it's true. So, after all the challenges of this year that you've had the thing that was sitting right in front of you the whole time your wife's business ended up being your most successful pivot for 2023. Would you say that's an accurate?

Dan Bigger

statement. I would say yes, you know, and there's the jury still out, because we have a long way to go. You know, the business is relatively small, but it has a huge ups.

Julie Basello

It has a huge upside.

Dan Bigger

I mean there's, there's nothing but up to go.

Julie Basello

That's the key right. There is the potential. I definitely think that, just looking at her business from the outside, looking in, knowing what I know about the art business and what it takes to run an art, an art based business, the potential is there. There's huge potential there. There's a huge upside to be had. That's my take.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, I'm even finding now, you know, after we go to shows and things like that, other industries and avenues that I can take that are untapped, that I never considered when I joined, you know, when I joined her three months ago. I mean I think we've added 30 new customers or more. That's amazing, and like really amazing and it's, it's simply from taking, you know, we've taken some, some calculated risks, you know, and we're getting more repetitive orders because I'm keeping up with customers and keeping them informed of what's going on.

Julie Basello

Well, let's talk about the calculated risks for a second, because in any reinvention adventure, see what.

I do there in any reinvention adventure, there's always going to be Risks. Some of them are calculated. Some of them are literally jumping off the cliff with a parachute ready to open. Hopefully, some of them are jumping off a cliff without a parachute and hoping you find one on the way down. You've heard that saying before, I'm sure. So would you say, where would you rank in terms of reinventions? Where would you rank the ability to take calculated risks on the list of important qualities to have as you embark on Reinventing yourself?

Dan Bigger

I think it all really depends on where you are in your life. Okay, you know, at this stage in my life with my kids, where they are, I really didn't want to take huge risks. You know, I'm more conservative again than my wife is, so I wanted to be able to support them and do everything that I was doing for them before. But now we're taking more calculated risk Well, not calculated more risk risks. You know higher risk stuff, because it's things that my wife hasn't done before, but she hasn't been able to do them. You know what I mean because she was just so strung out with doing what she was doing. So you know some of these things involve high ticket.

You know money and with me losing my job and being on a work for six months, you know these were big risks and you know the biggest risk we took recently was we did a show in Atlanta and it was it was high end and it was it was expensive, but it ended up working out very well for us.

Julie Basello

Which is great.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, and you know that was a risk that you know I wasn't completely on board with, because I didn't know where my career was going. I didn't know if I was going to stay with her or or go back to, you know, corporate America, you know, and I didn't want to commit to the, to doing the show with her. And then I got a job and now she's, you know, out on her own. So I was on the fence for a long, long time until I finally decided that and she sort of said to me she's like I don't want you to commit to this. If you don't want to do it, and I don't want you to commit to it, build it all up and then leave me stranded.

Julie Basello

Right Understandable it's a big venture. Those shows are a big venture.

Dan Bigger

So I think that's probably the biggest thing. I mean, if you're younger and sort of and this is going to sound bad, but a carefree attitude.

Julie Basello

Well, that leaves me out of the equation.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, but if you don't have kids and significant others and houses you have to sell and if you're willing to move and all this other stuff I mean.

Julie Basello

Well, hold up a second, though. One of the things you're forgetting in that whole equation that you just drew, that whole picture that you just painted, is there's no backup plan. So if someone like me right with very little baggage messes up on my risk taking, I don't have someone who's got the steady job behind me saying don't worry, you still have medical insurance, or don't worry, the mortgage is paid for a few months until you find something when you have nobody else in the equation. That's a whole other side of risk that people don't always consider.

Dan Bigger

No, that's true. But again, how risk averse are you? If you're 23, 24 and your friends are moving to California, are you willing to jump in the car and go back?

Julie Basello

Sure, it just depends on the person. Some people were raised. I was raised very conservatively. I was raised to shoot for that straight line, that straight line career trajectory. My father is a retired pharmacist. I have medical people throughout my family. I took a career path and ran with it. And then there's me, the creative, who was told to get the real job. And at 35 years old I had had a lot of success in a real job and decided okay, it's time to take the risk. It's now or never.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, but what is a real job? I mean any job, as long as you're successful at it and you're supporting yourself and you enjoy doing it. That's a real job to me.

Julie Basello

Well, you didn't see the air quotes when I was saying real job.

Dan Bigger

No, I get it.

Julie Basello

I don't know what a real job is, other than any job that pays you adequately for the duties you're performing. To me is a real job. However, some people view a more corporate structure as a real job and what I've done in the past and what you and Julie are doing now as more of a non-traditional job, but they're all real jobs at the end of the day.

Dan Bigger

And I say that again from experience, because I've seen what my wife has accomplished over her 18 years of being in business. And I have a creative daughter that's now getting ready to go to college and trying to figure out what she's going to do with the rest of her life, and I'm trying to advise her. But you have to advise her with caveats, I guess. So she wants to do something in art. She doesn't know exactly what that is yet, but again, with her being younger she can take a little bit more risk to try something, to see how it goes, and she can always do something on the side to make a little extra money until it pans out or does it, and then she can move to something else if she needs to. That's true Because, again, like you said, you never really know how things are going to work out. The market could crash, china could invade the United States, I mean, there's all kinds of things that could happen.

Again, I'm being honest, that's a significant possibility.

Julie Basello

No, I know, I know You're right, it's just yeah, we try not to go through life thinking of all of those things. Maybe we should.

Dan Bigger

I've been in US marketing for 25 years. I think of all that stuff.

Julie Basello

Yeah.

Dan Bigger

But you know.

Julie Basello

Well, it is a reality to some extent. I mean, anything can happen is really the lesson. So if anything can happen and somebody is waffling on their reinvention and I mean a reinvention that they're choosing, I don't mean a forced reinvention like life change reinvention I mean choosing to get outside of their norm and try something different that they've always wanted to try what are they waiting for if anything can happen at any time?

Dan Bigger

Yeah, again, the clock is ticking, so it's always ticking, so if you're in a position that you're not comfortable with, or it's a toxic environment or something like that, then you need to get out of it. You know, because I've been in all those toxic kind of places and it's not fun.

Julie Basello

They're not good, it becomes a drag.

Dan Bigger

It becomes a drag to get up in the morning and go to work. I mean, you know you could be a parent, that you know you have to do it and it's still not fun, but being here and doing things that you enjoy and actually and that's one thing that I have now- is.

I actually enjoy getting up in the morning because I don't know what I'm going to do and I don't know where I'm going to end up, but I enjoy it because I know why I'm doing it and I enjoy the latitude that I have to be an adult, which, again, corporate America doesn't allow you to do.

Julie Basello

No, they really don't always allow you to do that. Now, when you have certain types of managers that kind of cut through some of the standard corporate speak, there are certain managers that do give you latitude and do help you grow. They're not as prevalent as I wish they would be, but they are out there and they do have an impact and that does make a difference. Right and again, growing is what it's about.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, and going back to the, the mutual communication, and you know, relationship building, every real, every relationship I equate to dating. So you're dating and dating and dating to figure out who you know, who you're going to hang out with or what you're going to do with people. But once you enter into a relationship, it becomes a marriage and really again it's a 50-50.

You know, it is my boss helping me grow. Am I doing what my boss is asking me to do? Yep, Do they provide me with a latitude to do what I need to do to be successful? Are they listening to my feedback? Are they giving me constructive feedback that I can grow from? I mean again, it's the same thing. It's the same thing as a marriage.

Julie Basello

It is so, just a quick recap Communication, not being risk averse. In fact, being bold at points in time. These are things that I am hearing are some of the most important lessons you've gained from your reinvention stories.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, I would say I'm a lot more of a risk-taker than I was when I was younger, just simply because I've had to be. And you know things have worked out how they worked out not as planned, but they've worked out.

Julie Basello

So we both know, you and I, that reinvention is never really easy. I mean, we've used, we've thrown the word easy around a bit during this podcast episode, but we know it's not easy, in that there can be a lot of ups and downs and a lot of pain points, right. So someone out there is listening to this right now and they're thinking about their own desire to reinvent themselves career-wise. What would you say to that person about things to watch out for, and what encouraging words would you give them?

Dan Bigger

Again, I would say do it. You can't think back on things that you should have done because again they're going to haunt you for the rest of your life. Possibly, if you're not happy in your current situation, you need to start looking for other avenues to it. At least investigate starting. If you're a planner like me, investigate ideas that you think you could do. Maybe start it as a side project as it grows. Then you can make better decisions on.

Is this, on the other hand, something I want to do permanently and get out of what my normal thing is? Again, it all depends on your risk aversion. Some people just take the risk and quit their job and start the business and see where it goes. I'm not that person, but some people are like that. Again, my advice is to do whatever it is that's going to make you happy and allow you to get out of bed motivated and ready to attack the day, versus dreading going to work. Depending on your risk aversion, how much are you willing to accept? Because I actually, coming out of losing my job, I thought about starting my own company, but I wasn't on board with that because I knew how long it was going to tick to ramp up.

Julie Basello

Right, it wasn't the right time. I think it doesn't mean that it was the wrong idea. It was the right idea at the wrong time. That's going to come back around, you know it could.

Dan Bigger

It could.

Julie Basello

It will. I'll bug you about it. I'll bug you about it. So shameless plug time. Glimmer glass gifts. Where can one find glimmer glass gifts on the internet and out in the world, and what exactly does glimmer glass gifts produce?

Dan Bigger

Glimmer glass gifts was created by my wife so she could stay home with my kids. She originally started out doing retail shows up in central New York. When we started having kids two at a time, she realized that that was going to be a problem, so she ventured off into the wholesale market again without a net, just trying to figure it out and she did it. So what she has created was originally lines of jewelry. The jewelry is laser etch, so she takes glass, etches images on it and then puts it together, fuses it together in a kiln, and that's how she really got her business started with fused, laser etched glass jewelry, mainly around the tree of life Again.

Yeah, and then as COVID hit businesses, you know you couldn't go to businesses, you couldn't go to work, so all those things shut down. So she had some free time, so she created a line of greeting cards and wall art that have become phenomenally successful for her. So that's what glimmer glass gifts does. We do laser etched glass jewelry and fused glass art. Where you can find us is wwwglimmerglassgiftscom, and we are in over 250 stores across the country right now.

Julie Basello

That's amazing 250. Wow.

Dan Bigger

Yeah, one of our biggest accounts is actually Dollywood Dollywood in Silver Dollar City, nice.

Julie Basello

She did that all on her own.

Dan Bigger:

The other one is the Corning Museum of Glass. That's amazing too, and we're picking up new customers and things all the time. So we're growing and it's all good.

Julie Basello

Sounds like life is good. Dan, thank you so much for coming on the podcast and sharing your experiences. I really appreciate you being here and you have so many good lessons, and, of course, it's so much fun to catch up with you.

Dan Bigger:

No, as a friend of yours, you know I'll do anything to help you out and it was a privilege to be here and talk to you and I'm always willing to help you. You know that.

Julie Basello:

Thanks. I really appreciate that and if you'd like to reach out to Dan, his contact information is in the show notes for this episode. I'm so grateful you listened to this episode of my podcast and, as always, thank you, thank you. Thank you for listening. I appreciate you Until next time. This podcast is sponsored by Bicello Media, a boutique content creation agency supporting the marketing efforts of businesses through visual, written and audio content. If you'd like to contact me, my email is in the show notes. You can also find me on Instagram at Reinvention Adventures podcast or Bicello Media. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support this podcast, please share it with your tribe. Giving a rating and review is also appreciated. Thanks for listening to this episode of Reinvention Adventures.