I guess these delays have given me time to think more about owning a poker business and how I want things to be. The most important thing is that it after I have set things up, they run smoothly and don't give me the headaches that working as MD at sf group gave me. DTD is supposed to be a fun business, not a life and death scenario. I've always wanted a place where I could relax with my friends and collegues, have a few drinks and do a bit of gambling, and its important that DTD gives me this, and not a load of extra "business" grief instead.
Of course, everything that I do will always be run professionally and accurately, but enjoyment is the priority for me and thats why i'm willing to go through the pain of setting this thing up now. I can't say that the last 12 months have been a ball, as to get things this far has needed a lot of tedious work, but we are very close now, everything is lined up in the right direction, its just a case of ploughing through a bit more paperwork and we'll get the green light, I'm 95% sure.
Take Blondepoker for example, an awful lot of work has been put into this site, and the bigger it gets, the harder it gets, trying to keep all the members happy, whilst balancing the books. I guess the point I'm making is that owning and running businesses can often take up so much of your time and can sometimes be a thankless task working your butt off. I read that thread titled "Is Blondepoker becoming a spamming site?", what a joke that was, what the hell does someone expect to accomplish by posting stuff like that? How can anyone critise BP for marketing their own poker room on their own site or forum?
Sometimes you can end up working for everyone else apart from yourself and certain people always want to freeload or have a piece of you. I'm just not going the let this happen with DTD. Including management, the whole operation will employ 100 people, with Club members.........thats an awful lot of people to "keep happy". Well, you just can't please everyone, especially those who want something for nothing, or just have nothing else to do but "whine", so I'll be on the "if you don't like it then goodbye, nice to have known you" system (no matter who it is, member or employee).
I've also had quite a few people approach me to "do this" or "do that" with the DTD Club. Normally it's some "money making" scheme or a "favour" they just want to do me (ie. they want one back in the future). I'm just not interested in all of this crap, the DTD concept is simple: Have a great Club for decent people, and have an online card room that subsidises the costs of the Live Club. It makes me laugh when people say, "you can't charge a membership fee, you'll get less people coming in, casino's don't charge any fees" - first of all, maybe I want less people coming in, and second of all.........I can do what I want (a bit arrogant but true).
Some people may find my "like it or lump it" and "I don't want any favours thank you" approach a recipe for disaster in what should be customer based business. I agree, to maximise profits and grow turnover in a business, your customers and employees are absolutley crucial, and you must be prepared to bend over (literally) for them, to be ultimatley successful.........but this is not the DTD objective - so if you just want to have some fun, you gotta surround yourself with good friends, people you can trust, and don't do anything that you don't want to.
thats enough disjointed rambling for today, there's actually a "point" somewhere in this post.........
