As of February 2 I will be a professional shoeshiner. That is correct. I will be shining shoes. I am following in the footsteps of James Brown, Alejandro Toledo and Malcolm X and millions of other shoeshiners. I have updated my LinkedIn profile to reflect my new profession too.
You can read the whole story here on the New Tailor blog, in Dutch:
http://newtailor.nl/blog/
What it comes down to: I don’t like ‘networking’ much more than anybody out there. I talked about this with the founder of New Tailor (who happens to make my suits) and I told him he had an excellent network of clients who I would love to meet. We also agreed that a regular networking meeting would be boring. I suggested that everybody hates to shine his shoes, maybe even more than networking, and offered to do that during a monthly meeting. While I shine shoes I will be able to talk to interesting people and I assume that shining someone’s shoes makes a bigger impression that just handing our business-cards.
So now it is official. I’m shining shoes.
I hope to see you on Saturday, February 2 between 10 and 12 at new Tailor in the Honthorststraat 2a (between the Paulus Potter- and the PC Hooftstraat) in Amsterdam. I will only do one pair per person and you will have to wear the shoes.
Hope to see you there!
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18 Responses to “Time for a career change….”
:-)))
Genius.
Leuk idee.
AWESOME! That’s a nice new way to network :-)
My shoes need a little service anyway :p
Thanks for the comments guys! Looking forward to Saturday! See you there?
Great idea! For someone that has done “schoenen poetsen” in real life to make some money as a kid I can tell you that you will indeed meet all kind of interesting people.
Nice photo by the way
mind you: a good shoe shine begins with a comfortable chair
Great way to meet bootstrapped startups and well-heeled investors! Definitely a step in the right direction!
Another genius idea, Boris. I expect to see this on video on this blog every Saturday afternoon. It would be a great format for doing interviews, actually…
Look forward to a shine on Saturday 6th April after The Next Web Conference.
I mean Saturday 5th April. The 6th is Sunday. Shoe-d have checked. ;-)
read about it on Sprout.nl: http://www.sprout.nl/artikel.jsp?id=1178497
Brilliant! I’ve marked it in my calendar. Hopefully it won’t be too busy. I’ve been meaning to give my nice pair of black Van Bommel’s a shine, but haven’t come around to it, yet. Twee vliegen in één klap dus!
Ps. New Tailor’s blog mentions Februari 1st, not 2nd.
oh great I have to be at the chicken farm in the morning and will come straight after that to NT!
great! i have a very large collection of shoes at my house which needs to be shoeshined…i’ll bring them…:-)
klasse actie.
Read about it on Bright:
http://www.bright.nl/boris-gaat-schoenen-poetsen
You’re a genius B.
Linkbait in person :p
Kost het ook iets? … ben verdorie toch nog zo Nederlands.