I love movies. I’ll probably share a lot of movies I enjoy and relate them to ecommerce and other online topics in the eHarbor blog. Today I’ll talk about “The Natural” (1984). I’ve read the book and seen the movie and I think the movie is much better than the book. Much of the book’s somber themes are in the movie, but there are also so many emotional highs and payoffs that I can’t help cheering on Roy Hobbs as he always swings for the fence. Despite his flaws, Roy is a good man who wants to be the best baseball player to ever swing a bat.
I bring up “The Natural” because in one scene, when Roy gets to bat in the major leagues for the first time, his coach jokingly tells him to “Knock the cover off the ball.” He takes his coach’s advice literally and actually hits the ball so hard that the cover comes completely off. That marvelous scene reminds me of something I heard at the 2009 eHarbor Kick-Off Meeting on Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2009. Excitement filled the air as all 50 employees filed into a large auditorium, and CEO Oliver Bigler laid out our plans for the new year. In his presentation, Bigler said that eHarbor’s slogan for 2009 is “Swinging for the fence.”
Just like Roy Hobbs.
What do we mean by “swinging for the fence”? In 2008, eHarbor launched two new services: Real Estate Investor and Magellan Commerce. It built new partnerships and dramatically increased its monthly revenue. In 2009, we’re going to do much more. Bigler said he expects the company’s revenue to grow 500 percent. Two new websites are already in the works, focusing on real estate and ecommerce. Plus, the company is going to launch redesigns of most of its current websites: Submit Solution, Real Estate Promoter, Real Estate Investor, Direct Home Find, and Magellan Commerce.
We enjoyed J Dawgs at the close of the meeting. Eating those hot dogs reminded me of baseball games, as well. If you’ve never tried one and you visit Provo, Utah, I would recommend them.
We’ll keep you informed about our goal to swing for the fence, and hopefully the field will be littered with baseball covers by the time the season is through.
