TLDR:
Petite Frites celebrates “anti-milestones” -– this is a term we totally made up to encapsulate the kind of moments that can be perceived as negative, scary, or simply ordinary, but actually are the most transitional. One of Katie’s anti-milestones is blowing $10K on an ad campaign that didn’t exactly work, but learning how to fail publicly, and Jackie’s is quitting things that don’t feel right and learning to trust her instinct.
FROM THE DESK OF OUR FOUNDERS...
At Petite Frites, we believe in celebration. Big time. Of course we love celebrating promotions, engagements, babies, property purchases, raises, etc., but these are usually very positive and widely-accepted “milestones”. But what do WE really love to celebrate? The “anti-milestone”.
What is an anti-milestone, you ask? It is a term we totally made up to encapsulate the kind of moments that can be perceived as negative, shameful, scary, or simply ordinary but actually are the most transitional, and therefore very worthy of celebrating. A friend once described “Type 2 Fun” to us, “something not fun in the moment, but fun to reminisce about later,” and we feel like this similarly applies.
When you think back on anti-milestones that you’ve personally experienced, we are positive that they have served as core memories, empowering ones that should be commemorated. For some, commemoration may be a photo in a scrapbook, for others, a tattoo––but at Petite Frites, we encourage you to honor your anti-milestones with, what else? Gold and diamonds. When you invest in one of our celebratory baubles, we hope it will be worn as a daily reminder of the anti-milestone you conquered.
In honor of launching this new celebratory concept, we share some of ours below:
Katie’s “Public” Shaming…
With the goal of acquiring new customers in the early days of Underclub, I decided to run a huge (at the time) marketing test. I spent $10K hiring experts and buying ad placements and talked up the campaign to friends. In the end, we acquired perhaps one new customer. I felt humiliated to fail publicly like that (although not too publicly since no one watched the ad!), but in the end, I know learning to fail in this way has been absolutely pivotal in my career. I’ve learned to put fear of failure aside (or at least in perspective) when making big decisions, and all entrepreneurs need to learn this.
Jackie’s Ability to Quit…
My anti-milestone is quitting. I landed what I thought was my dream job. From the outside, the job looked prestigious and perfect, but on the inside I felt over-worked, under-paid, and taken totally for granted. I knew that walking away would be a risk, but I also knew that if I stayed, I would not only burn out, but drown. Many people encouraged me to “stick it out” but I knew in my gut I had to leave. To this day, I use quitting this job to remind myself that just because something looks perfect to others doesn’t mean that it’s perfect for me.
Now we turn the storytelling to YOU! Tell us what anti-milestone, past or on-going, that we can celebrate with you.
Jackie (Petite) and Katie (Frites)