Every Monday I throw out a challenge to readers. Something to keep everybody on the right track toward accomplishing the right goals and moving your wine career forward.

This week: the 60 day sprint and how to be ready for it.

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Welcome to October 31st and happiest of Halloweens! A favorite holiday around our house, not only because of the candy, the kids, the scary movies, and the decorations, but also because it marks the starting gun for an amazing sprint to the end of the year.

As of today you have SIXTY DAYS. Sixty days to make your final impact on 2016, before it is gone forever.

Time is the only commodity that we cannot get back. Once it is gone, it’s gone.

Take that idea and overlap it with the simple fact that an inordinate amount of wine selling happens in this sixty day stretch (on all sides: wholesale, retail, and restaurant) and you have the makings of a chaotic situation. This is why a few months ago I urged you to take your foot off the gas for a bit.

Taking the time RIGHT NOW to plot out the next sixty days is essential to achieving your goals.

A quick run down of goals and plans to work on today, to make the next sixty days a success:

• What are your sales goals in dollars? If you don’t know where to start with that question, look at last November and December, boost it by 15%, then divide it by 60. There, you now have a daily goal. Track it! Follow it daily. Know where you are at, always. If you need to make one more stop, one more push at the end of the day to hit that goal, do it!
• What are your sales goals by volume? Use the same metric as above. (Sometimes, depending on the economy or a particular territory, tracking case sales is easier and more fun than total dollars … if you know your average case sale is $100, you can easily translate that into a dollar goal vs. case goal).
• What are you pouring, where and when?
  • If you are a retailer, do you have your in store tasting dates, topics, wines, and reps all lined up for 60 days?
  • If you are wholesale rep, do you know exactly who you are pouring for and when? (hint: by having your schedule as full as you want it to be, you can legitimately say no to all other requests that come in at the last second)
• Do you know exactly what days (or half days) you are taking off to be with your family, go shopping, and enjoy your life? This is essential to the balance. Don’t just put the phone on silent. Turn it off and put it away. Spend time with those that you love, for that is why you do what you do during the day.

Hint: pick a great bottle of wine, put “December 31st, 2016” on it, put it somewhere that you will see it, and look forward to enjoying that bottle after the 60 day sprint is done. You will deserve it!