A Visit to Garden Shoes Online

– Posted in: Tools and Equipment
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As I mentioned on Tuesday, this past Friday I visited the Gearcor.com facility with bloggers Donalyn, Jenn, Nicki, and Teresa, who is an employee of Gearcor.

Carol Yeager

Carol Yeager

Carol Yeager is the driving force behind Gearcor, which started out on her dining room table as Muck Boots Online, and has grown to encompass Rain Boots Online, Snow Boots Online, Overshoes Online, Sock Socks, and, most importantly to my readers, Garden Shoes Online. And I do mean driving force when I speak of Carol. That woman doesn’t stop moving. Among five camera-toting bloggers we could only come up with one non-blurry shot of her. Carol had been looking for a way to contribute to the household income while staying at home with her growing children. She fell in love with her own pair of Muck boots one especially snowy winter and started selling them in 2003. “Back then, if I got five orders in one day, I was doing the happy dance,” Carol recollects. Eventually they acquired warehouse space in Johnson City, NY, but the offices were in a separate location. “That was never good,” she admits. Now they have moved to a 28,000 square foot warehouse with surplus office space they hope to sublease eventually.

As we entered the warehouse part of the building, Carol told us, “Our goal is to have everything ordered from yesterday and overnight shipped out today.” I was impressed with the equipment they’ve installed in their new facility to improve efficiency. The packer scans each invoice and then scans the bar code of each item as it’s placed in the box. If there is a discrepancy, a buzzer goes off, alerting the packer to the error before the box is even sealed, much less shipped out.

Scanning Orders

The packer scans the order first. Each item will also be scanned as it is placed in the box.

I confess to being fascinated by the taping machine. You see, when the packer unfolds a flattened box in preparation for packing, she doesn’t tape the bottom.
Taping machine

The taping machine entranced my geeky little self. I should have taken a video of it in action.

When the box is filled, she folds down the top flaps and then pushes it through the taping machine, which tapes both the bottom and the top at the same time. If you’ve ever struggled with packing tape you can appreciate what a time saver that is. From there, the sealed and addressed boxes are stacked on a pallet, awaiting pick up by UPS.

All the employees seemed to be friends working hard to achieve a common goal. Just about every employee we met was hired because they were a friend of someone already working there, so I guess that’s not too surprising. Teresa brought her grandbaby to work, and not only was no one surprised, they all took turns holding her. This friendliness was extended to their visitors as well. Not only was lunch provided for us, but Debbie, one of the employees, brought Christmas-themed dishes from home to set a welcoming table.

More Pictures and Accounts of the Day

Fun at Work – Teresa’s post
Lunch with Local Social Media Mavens – Nicki’s post

Facebook Promotion

Garden Shoes Online is sponsoring a Christmas Wish Give Away on Facebook. It ends on December 15th so check it out now!

Photo of Carol Yeager courtesy Teresa Soule. I am an affiliate of Gearcor and purchases made after clicking through my website earn me a small commission.

About the Author

Kathy Purdy is a colchicum evangelist, converting unsuspecting gardeners into colchicophiles. She gardens in rural upstate NY, which used to be USDA Hardiness Zone 4 but is now Zone 5. Kathy’s been writing since 4th grade, gardening since high school, and blogging since 2002. Find her on Instagram as kopurdy.

In its own way, frost may be one of the most beautiful things to happen in your garden all year . . . Don’t miss it. Like all true beauty, it is fleeting. It will grace your garden for but a short while this morning. . . . For this moment, embrace frost as the beautiful gift that it is.

~Philip Harnden in A Gardener’s Guide to Frost: Outwit the Weather and Extend the Spring and Fall Seasons

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teresa December 12, 2010, 9:14 pm

Thanks Kathy for all the kind words. It was a fun lunch and I am so glad all of you could attend. We do have a lot of fun at Gearcor (Garden Shoes Online). They are great people to work for and work with. I feel very lucky to be able to call all of those that work there my friends. Thanks for the link to the give away, I hope all of your readers will visit and get a chance to win their favorite product from Garden Shoes Online. Talk to you soon! Merry Christmas!