as like, Hey, I can help you. You know, spend that money that's mandated. So they set it aside, you know, you gotta go for it. And we just try to kind of help everybody get there. It's not an easy process at all, but if you can, if you can make a good go of it, you can actually do a heck of a lot of business. Marshall Atkinson So just curious, what, what percentage of business would you say from your overall sales comes from these connections versus just I'm using you because you're in my same I would say currently, um, off the top of my head, I'm going to say right now, probably only about 18%, actually. It's not our core focus. Uh, we definitely do not leverage it as much as we probably could. And one of the reasons why is that? Because we're a tier two supplier, once again, you know, we're down on the food chain a little bit, we're not going right up to like the big corporations and the federal government. We're going to, you know, patties promotional products and saying, Hey, this is who we are. And so as the pool gets larger, Of diverse suppliers then, and you start swimming in that pool. You start making a little bit of traction, um, but it's still a very small pool. So we, you know, and the other component of that is just our business model and the way we do business, to be honest with you, most of the, most of the companies that. neighborhood? Monica Maglaris That contract to us is straight white men, because that's just the predominant group that you know, that you're talking to. And so it doesn't, it doesn't add up to a whole hell of a lot of volumes. But what it is doing though, is it’s sort of chipping away a little bit and to the point where maybe that playing field can get a little bit more even, and it's, it's great. It expands your network of people a bit. But as I said before, I've looked at it as way more of an opportunity for me to serve my community. Than anything. So I've spent more time advocating for other people to get certified than I have to leverage my own certification. If that makes any sense Marshall Atkinson It does. And Monica, we should talk. I bet I can help you with that. Marshall Atkinson Things I've always liked about you is you don't shy away from the fact that you're gay and you're a member of the national gay and lesbian chamber of commerce. Can you talk that a little bit about what it just brings to the table for you? You know, have you lost business because of it, if somebody got, you know, kind of like that bakery that won't make the cake, you know, kind of a thing or whatever, like also, how does it. I think being your authentic, true self, I just feel so natural. Right. So we just want to do what we do, right? Yeah. Um, so talk about that a little bit. Cause, um, you know, I just want to make sure everybody kind of understands Monica Maglaris Sure. To the best of my knowledge, we've not lost any business from being open about who we are and that.
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