My wife uses a wall calendar to mark my speaking engagements, business deadlines and personal dates on for both her records and for me to keep track of visually. 

She needs one that she can erase information and place updates when times or flights change (as they do frequently).  That is hard to find, for some reason and her father’s desk calendar, while convenient, won’t allow for a full year viewing in one glance.

Last month I wrote about my father-in-law who uses a simple desk calendar to send out to his clients as an annual marketing tool.  I told him how the salesman convinced him to purchase the deluxe calendars with a thermometer on the face of the calendar. 

When my father-in-law asked him initially about the advantage of the pricier calendars with the thermometer, the sharp salesman said, “You are buying space on people’s desks.”  It hit a note with my father-in-law who purchases them every year. 

So this week I received a package in the mail from Illinois.  I went to the post office desk to retrieve it, wondering what I had been sent.  I wasn’t expecting anything that I had ordered online.  The package was a long, round container, like you would send a poster in to someone to protect it.

Upon opening an erasable marker slid out with a wall calendar for the entire year.  A business care slid out from a company in Illinois.  On the back of the card was a simple note: “Buying Space, You spoke at an IMAWA convention. Thanks!”  He had heard me present almost four years ago!

This couldn’t have come at a better time or been more useful to us.  The gentleman had read the first article and wanted me to have a reminder of his business and the presentation.  What a nice thought and way of remembering him for future business!

Do you send thank you cards, or nice items out that benefit people, or just include your features?  He bought space, not only on my desk, but in this blog for the world to see. You will never know how an act of kindness will be multiplied.

Thank you, Micahel Illingworth, of United Van Lines, AllChicagoland.  The gift is very appreciated and I am passing your kind gesture onto our Reinvention Nation readers!