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Explore the world of business and entrepreneurship in Wichita. Learn from local business owners from a variety of industries as they share their experiences with hosts and Evergy leaders, Don Sherman and Ebony Clemons-Ajibolade, who are also small business owners. You’ll learn how they have built and grown their companies and the challenges and opportunities they encountered along the way. This podcast is brought to you by the Wichita Regional Chamber of Commerce and is powered by Evergy.
Ep87_MaryKateDenton
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Don and Ebony: [00:00:00] Welcome to another exciting edition of the W C B A powered, a course, by Evergy. Thank you for listening. Don't forget to like us share us. We truly appreciate you checking us out. Today, we are excited to have Mary Kate and Company in the house. E. Hi, Mary Kate.
Mary Kate Denton: Hi,
Don and Ebony: Hi, how are you this fine day?
Mary Kate Denton: I'm doing great.
Don and Ebony: Wonderful. We are so glad to have you here with us. Tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do.
Mary Kate Denton: who am I? I am, a career hairdresser. be number one. I am in my 35th year. I think I actually haven't counted. I think it's 35th year in the industry.
Don and Ebony: That's awesome.
So I'm not supposed to ask I was. Well,
No. Okay. I can't calculate it either. I'm
Mary Kate Denton: I can tell you my age, that doesn't bother me because, but yes, I, I was first licensed in 1987.
Graduated high school in 80.
Don and Ebony: What high school?
Bishop Carol
Don and Ebony: That's okay. Northwest.
Mary Kate Denton: Just all right. I grew up in the neighborhood. Yeah. Yeah. My family's still, in fact, my salon's in that neighborhood, right between Northwest and Bishop.
Don and Ebony: Carroll. Nice. Very nice. Nice. So what's the name of your
Mary Kate Denton: The salon's called Mary Kate and Company.
Don and Ebony: Mary Kate and Company. And who's the Company. What
Mary Kate Denton: So the company, well, when we first started 15 years ago, I had already been in the industry for 20 years. so I had a large clientele and I had had a lot of success, but I, I, wanted to create something bigger than just myself. Mm-hmm so it's funny because company, we get teased a lot because I, I actually own this salon with my sister, her name's Becky.
Okay. But she sometimes gets called company.
Don and Ebony: So you're a company.
Mary Kate Denton: Either she gets called Kate or she gets called company, or, you know, we just teased a lot, but, she's behind the scenes more often. She's actually a really great pre people person, probably better than me. But when we first started, she brought to the table accounting experience and bookkeeping experience, which I never wanted to do.
And, so I love that. And a lot of business experience. She used to work at Koch industries, at Invista. And so 15 years ago when I started, it was just me. I hired a couple brand new hairdressers who had no experience, no clientele. And, my sister. It was just us. and flying by the seat of her pants.
No, I'm, like, here we go. And so, you know, my goal was to help grow other hairdressers and grow the salon, into, you know, I didn't, I, I think I thought I had a vision back then, but my vision became clearer over time. Like, it's not like at the very beginning, I just knew I wanted it to be bigger and to.
Something special, but I hadn't, I had not clearly defined that in the very beginning. So that was in, that was at the end of 2006. we start, we opened in December. It was kind of a strange move to open, but that's just how it, how it panned out.
Don and Ebony: That's awesome. So you began with, you know, somewhat of a vision, but now it's turned out to be something greater than you ever thought it would be, huh? Yeah. Yeah. So shout out to.
Mary Kate Denton: Yes.
Don and Ebony: thankful for her. So talk to us a little bit about, you know, starting off with the few people you started off with mm-hmm the few, but mighty to now this large salon.
Mary Kate Denton: Yeah, well, a lot of blessings and luck and also a lot of sticktuitiveness, through some major difficulties for sure, where I was the most, successful and also lucky was. The clientele and the people that I had met over the years that were really loyal to me and then became loyal to my sister and to our, our team.
And really we drew, I have [00:05:00] never, I, in all these years, I've really never had to recruit, employees. So I'm very lucky in that respect. And it's. My team that each person that came along and, and my own reputation and Becky's reputation, and then the Mary Kate and company reputation over the years started to grow.
And, different stylist just started showing up, saying, I wanna work with you. and I even had a few people who I had worked with in the past who said, you, I, I miss working there with you and I'd like to come work with you. So that was very complimentary of me, but also gave, made me feel a lot of responsibility for what I was doing, you know, cause they looked to me and our business for structure for, discipline, for knowledge, for training, for fun, all, all the things.
Don and Ebony: That's crazy. Don, did you hear it? She's never had to recruit. Everyone has dead. I'm stuck on that. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, let's, let's talk about that for a little bit, because obviously there's a certain culture that you are creating within your salon. That's making people and stylist and clients and. Everyone come to you and navigate to you.
So let's talk about your culture.
Mary Kate Denton: Well, that is probably the thing we are most proud of and it was born over time. Like I said, I think. Culture when we first started was just kind of me like who, who was I as a person? And, then Becky and I, you know, yeah. We, we made a business plan and we got started, but in our business plan, we, we weren't even really talking about culture yet.
I don't, I can't remember those first. I just remember knowing who I was and then knowing what her strengths were and kind of like, let's go for it. Mm-hmm luckily I had a lot because I had 20 years behind me. I had a lot of knowledge of the industry, which helped a lot, but, and I also had a lot of knowledge about commission and booth rental, and we are.
Don and Ebony: Which is so interesting.
Mary Kate Denton: So that's another interesting thing about us that, is very different for us. You
Don and Ebony: Never heard of that.
Mary Kate Denton: Yeah. A lot of people haven't. It's very, very common. We like being different. we're proud of our differences and it's, it's, it's that difference that helps create our culture.
So I will, I'm gonna try to explain it to you. Okay. Because it is, it is hard to, you'll have to ask questions if I'm not getting to it all the way, but. Our culture started, like I said, with our personalities and who we were and what we believed in too. Yeah. And then it was just like, go, go, go create, a salon that's successful financially, but then things happened where, the finances weren't going so well.
And, in, by, so we opened at the end of 2006. So basically 2007 was our first year by 2009, we were in horrible financial shape. And this is not because we didn't have clients. It was just because we, we moved too fast on things, made poor decisions and procrastinated. specifically taxes so our, we, we had a very humiliating and difficult time that year.
We were featured in the Wichita Business Journal with a large headline that said west Wichita salon, $102,000 in debt to the IRS. at the time we had both a state and a federal. debt and part of that, hundred, two total that they had, like when I saw the, when I saw the headline, I mean, I didn't even know how much it was, but it, it, had grown like doubled because of penalties.
And, so what had happened was we had reached out to the IRS for help and said, Hey, we are behind, what can we do? and we didn't get help. We just got, you know, them coming after us. Mm-hmm and. it felt like we were criminals. It was really difficult. Mm-hmm so it was a hard situation, obviously, because emotionally it was very draining and, and, humili humiliating in the, in the public eye.
Everyone we knew, knew about it. but we knew in our hearts that we didn't do this on purpose. We weren't trying to get away with anything. We just, making stupid, decisions along the way. Some of it just kind of like, I was working six days a week behind the chair and was oblivious to what was going on.
And my sister was trying to protect me from that information. So when it all came to light, here's where things got better, actually. We went through this terrible thing, but it made us regroup. It made us dig deep and figure out how are we gonna do this? What kind of sacrifices are we gonna make? And. Who, who are our friends?
Who's who's who still believes in us mm-hmm that kind of thing. And it was amazing what came [00:10:00] out of that, that year we created, with our team. And here's another amazing thing is our team I'm, I'm looking around. We had, we had, I can't remember exactly how many employees we had that, that year. but we had enough employees that I looked around and we both just felt terrible for dragging them through this.
Mm-hmm like our reputation was their reputation too. Right. And so, we had a lot of talks with them and talked about this is where we're at. This is what happened. we were so blessed and lucky that they trusted us and they understood that what happened. Wasn't like something that we ever, you know, we didn't mean for it to happen.
Mm-hmm , you know, we just got in over our heads in the beginning. Right. So, they stuck with us. I mean, I, I didn't lose anybody at that time and I may have lost a few clients I don't even know about. And that's okay at what I don't know. I don't know. but I had a lot of really loyal people and people reaching out wanting to help too.
That's a blessing. so anyway, we made it through, we paid off our lien. In three years and then fast forward to now we've expanded we've yeah. gotten a lot, a lot more people on our side. and what came out of that was a lot of confidence where something could have destroyed us. Instead, we became more confident cause we learned that we could deal.
We could deal with things we could get through it. we, we figured out what all our resources were that we didn't even. Who were, who were our resources? we also started giving more, that was something that we added to our culture at the time as we started. we said, I, I still remember, I, we had a business coach and we had had to fire our business coach because we couldn't afford it at that time.
but one of the things on our goals was to start giving more communities, start doing more charitable, work mm-hmm . And I remember looking at my sister and going, we don't have anything. How are we gonna give anything? You know, I mean, that's the typical thing is like, you feel like you don't have anything and how, how can you give, but you really do have, you really do have your talents.
You have your time and there's still some treasure there, you know? so that was a huge. lesson and just blessing at the same time. So that's when that became part of our culture that year, we created a salon prayer along with our, re using our team to recreate our mission. So our whole mission, everything about our vision evolved.
I'm not gonna say it changed cause we always wanted to be something bigger than ourselves, but it evolved from there. We created. One of our tags or it's not really a tagline, but we created the MK co ripple and the ripple effect we at the time, and this is right when the Internet's really starting to get going where we're starting to advertise.
And like when we first started, we didn't have Facebook to advertise on or anything. But, so this is the same time. So we're starting to put out there that that's who we are, you know, We want to give more. And so we gave a lot and it seems like so much more came back to us. And I know, I know people tell stories about that all the time, but it is the truth.
It's true. It is the truth. And we had a team that was totally on board with it, who were really proud of it. And they gained that pride and we created goals to be the best salon experience in Wichita to be, have a reputation as the best salon and. we looked around our little salon at the time we had seven chairs and little dingy.
I mean, it was dingy. and just, I don't, I don't know. I, I just, I kind of get overwhelmed when I think about it. I didn't necessarily give you all the information on my, on, on our culture, but that's where the culture really evolving. having our faith be a part of our culture. we, I haven't hired anyone in all these years since then, without telling them exactly who we are, what we stand for and what we do every day.
For instance, pray. We, we have a, we have a huddle every morning where we talk about our goals for the day and we have a prayer that we say together. And now I'm gonna say I have a diverse, Team, our team is diverse. Not everybody has the same beliefs mm-hmm but one thing they do have is that they knew exactly who they were saying yes to when they decided to work there.
So they decided to work there regardless of if we all believed the same things, but just that they, they loved what we stood for anyway. Right. And, and that way there's never really a conflict on that because we always go back to you. I don't, I really don't have to remind anybody, but if I did, I could say, remember when we first talked and we first met and we went over all these things that Mary Kate and company stands for that Becky and I stand for you.
You knew this is who you're working for. I could say that if I needed to, honestly, I really haven't had to. we have a lot of love. we created our list of values [00:15:00] and please don't ask me to list 'em all off right now. Cause I'm not good at at that. But love is one of them and teamwork is one of them.
And so we, we all know what we value. We all know what we're trying to do. We have common goals every not only every day, do we have a common goal, but every month, every year. So everyone's working toward the same. And that's what makes us different is that we're part of something bigger. It's not just me being part of something bigger or creating something bigger.
Each person who works at the salon is also part of part of that and, and proud of it too. And that's what I want them to feel for the rest of their careers. I have seven people, 17 members who've been. More than 12 years out of the 15 that we've been open. So most of them almost 15. Wow. So that's something also, that's unusual in this industry.
Don and Ebony: That's excellent. Thanks for sharing that. And I don't wanna belabor, that turning point there, but there's. There's a learning opportunity for folks in business. I mean, people think it's really easy to hang up your shingle. And I mean, you've been in business 20 years successful, apparently wanting to get bigger and time you went bigger, you had a I'll call it a hiccup, you know?
And, can you just share what, what, how did you feel at that time? I know you shared a little bit. When you were writing high expanding, then all of a sudden you get this WBJ article as a business owner. What does that do?
Mary Kate Denton: Okay. So we hadn't. To the writing high and expanding oh, wow. Stage yet. So this was just like, we were just beginning. I mean, like I, my goals at the time were I'm, I'm working hard, but I had to focus on my clients, but I was also trying to focus on this little team that I was right. I was trying to, foster and help them in their careers and learn how to do what I do and how to do it even better than.
And so I really had, we hadn't reached that point yet. Wow. We had just reached a point of like, this is hard and, when are we gonna make any money? You know, like, you know, like that we had, we had not at that. So we were already feeling this devastation before we'd even reached any form. The I've always felt successful.
So it's like I had a form of success because I knew. I was well liked. I knew that, I had a lot of clients that kind of thing. Mm-hmm but so there's always a form of success along the way, but my success. At that time, wasn't realized as far as what I dreamed of at all, not even close. And so what was it like at the time, at the time there was a lot of sleepless nights, not sleeping, worrying about my health, worrying about my sister, worrying about the team and what all, what they were all thinking all the time.
of course I'm, I'm a woman who has a lot of those, those self-doubt moments, you know, like there was a lot of self-doubt I had to constantly. Feed myself, the right things to help me overcome that.
Don and Ebony: Wow. Well, thanks for sharing that. And I just wanted that for our listeners. I mean, we, I think we have 1400. Small business members that belong to the chamber. That's a lesson that you could take with you and, move on. Let's get to the, the good part. Now when you decided to expand and I mean, what was your definition of you wanted to be bigger?
Mary Kate Denton: What, what, what, you know, when we, when we start, when we created the M K Co ripple, I remember just talking about how we wanted to create a bigger ripple effect. Okay. On our it's not just on the community, it's, starting with our team, the team, the people that work for us. are the most important to us?
They're our first clients. I, I used to always talk about like, they're my first clients over and above my actual clients that come in. Yes. They're the ones that come in are the ones that are bringing the money in. But if I'm not taking care of the ones inside the salon, then who are we? We have nothing.
but, sorry, I lost my train of thought there. What was your question again?
Don and Ebony: What was, you said you wanted to do things bigger than after 20 years you felt you could
Mary Kate Denton: Yeah, so we started defining at that time we, we defined, so we, we said, well, what is bigger? What do we want? What do we want? Right. And everyone on the team just wanted to be the best we wanted to be the best. So we said, what, what is the best? You know, and we just reputation wise. We wanted to be the best in, in, in town.
And we knew that it didn't just involve being the best at doing hair. Because what we, what we've learned over the years is that there are a lot of talented people out in the world. There's a lot of talented hairdressers around and putting, putting us all up against each other. It's like, we're all good.
We're all good. There's there's yeah. I mean, trying to just be the best at, at the [00:20:00] talent itself. Isn't that's not fulfilling to us. Okay. So what, what it was was to be the best to where people just loved to come to us. Okay. we talked a lot about, and I'm I'll show my age. I was talking, we talked about the, we talked about the norm factor from cheers.
We call the Norm factor. I think this might have been in a book. I read somewhere, but the norm factor where, you know, everybody you come in because everybody knows your name there and just love being there. So that's Norm from Cheers. You guys know what I'm talking about. Okay. Thank you.
Don and Ebony: Ebony knows. She might try to act like she don't know, but she don't. Everyone knows about cheers.
Mary Kate Denton: That that, so that combined with also learning about, really successful large businesses, that have created systems and processes that. Allow their business to expand in a way that, you know, is seamless. Okay. I don't have another location right now, but I'm at the point where I could do that because I've created those systems and processes.
Nice. So, and that took a long time to get there and it's, it's an, it's a constantly evolving process, but when I would, stand up in front of my team and. Do this, like, this is what we're trying to get to. You know, I would talk about big places like Starbucks or Walt Disney or whatever things that where no matter where you go in the world to even McDonald's, you know, where no matter where you are in just the United States, you go in one of those businesses, you're gonna get the same.
Service you're gonna get the same great feeling. Hopefully that's what you count on. And so, yeah, you can, you can be really disappointed if all of a sudden you go into what you might term as a really sucky Starbucks or something. But most of the time, if you get the same drink at Starbucks here in Wichita, and then you go somewhere else on vacation and you get you order the same drink, you're gonna get the same thing. So that's kind of part of what we added to our culture too, is to add that time kind of thing. Even though we only have one location at this point, it's also just person to person in the salon, sharing that information with each other about how to take care of clients.
So that. Say you're coming in and you're used to this great service that you always get from. So and so, and she had surgery yesterday, cuz she broke her arm or something, you know? And you, you, we still have someone who can take care of her cuz we do share that information and we have those systems in place.
Don and Ebony: Excellent E well, I appreciate that. That your, your story is just so fascinating to me. This is darn cool. Yeah. It's.
Mary Kate Denton: To share the bad stuff. Like it, it definitely. You know, if you've everybody threw anything embarrassing or humiliating, it's hard to.
Don and Ebony: But you've overcome it and it's the other side of it. But I think that's, what's really critical, especially for young businesses as they are listening to this. Right. Because as they are going through some of those hardships, exactly. Sometimes they don't think that they're gonna make it through that.
This is the end of the world and having that positive affirmation, From you is, is really, really positive. And so thank you for sharing that and being vulnerable with our listeners to tell about that. So friends, it's about time for us to hear a word from our sponsors. We're gonna be back listening to more from Mary Kate and the Mary Kate and company. Welcome back friends. We're here with our friend, Mary Kate Denton, from the Mary Kate and Company. We're hearing about her journey as she's been in business for 35 years since she's sharing some, wisdom with us. So. Mary Kate, can you kind of talk to us a little bit about where you get your inspiration from?
Mary Kate Denton: That's a good question. I'm mostly inspired by people just like I have really enjoyed, two years ago, I stepped away from working behind the chair and I have really enjoyed having the time to get out more in the community and meet people, especially people who are smarter than me. I've been really looking to learn as much as I.
Also like, yes, I have things that I can share and teach others about business, but there's still so much, I don't know. And so much that I've just missed along the way, because I was working behind the chair all the time.
Don and Ebony: How does that feel? Not to be behind the chair. Is that weird?
Mary Kate Denton: Oh, it was very strange. and the, the timing was odd.
I actually chose to do this in 2000. 2019 is when the plan kind of happened. So it was January of 2020, right before the pandemic [00:25:00] happened that I decided to do this. So it was pretty scary. but yes, just another lesson that, Hey, the business is flourishing without me standing there. So
Don and Ebony: well, that's awesome. so I'm interested, you're born and raised in Wichita. I went to, school here and you decided to stay in Wichita.
What is it about the Wichita ecosystem that makes you wanna stay and to expand. And not move away
Mary Kate Denton: health first and foremost would be, my family I'm from a very large family. And, so there's a, I, I have a large support system and I think that's very important to me is to, Just stay close to them. I, I, I love Wichita also. I have, I have never been one of the Wichita naysayers or one of the people that grew up and said, I can't wait to get outta here.
That wasn't me. Although I did move to Dallas for a year, but that was because of marriage, not because of, Because I wanted to get outta Wichita. So I've always loved Wichita came back a year later. See, , I've been here ever since. Yeah. We're
Don and Ebony: So glad to have you here and champion, of Wichita and sharing this story. I, am always pleased to see, when people move away and then decide to come back. So, thank you for, for being a yaysayer.
Mary Kate Denton: Yeah.
Don and Ebony: yaysayer nice. Yeah, I appreciate that. I
Mary Kate Denton: a great upbringing. I think that makes a big difference. I just, I enjoyed my childhood here and I, I, I, was born in Kansas city, but I lived here since I was two years old.
Other than that one year
Don and Ebony: Very nice. And you are a member of the Chamber. So I, the, the Chamber has a lot of neat, things going on there and like this podcast for one mm-hmm all right. but what are some of the reasons why you, you find the chamber to be so exciting?
Mary Kate Denton: Well, and that's speaking about having more time now, I'm starting to delve into more resources and happenings that are going on. Cuz when we first joined the Chamber, I was just like, I don't have time for any of that stuff. I mean, that's really how it felt. And so we would, we would randomly send people to things like here, go check that out, go, go do some networking.
But I was, I was really not involved in it and I just kind of. Didn't even know what all there was. And like I said, I told you a minute ago, the, the meeting people has been the most fun and through the chamber and other, other ways of networking at Wichita, I'm really, enjoying, expanding my, what do you wanna call it?
Just, just knowing others, you know, as far as the Chamber's concerned, also, I, we talked about the failure, but some of the success came later. We did actually. We've won an award through the Wichita business journal and through the chamber of Wichita. we insured and I sometimes get these confused as far as the years they happen.
But, with the. With the Wichita business journal, which was really great considering we had that negative article long years and years back in 2009. I believe it was 2018, not positive. we were second place in the best places to work competition.
Wow.
So that was, yeah, that was a big deal. And entering these contests in the chamber, Kuhn the chamber, I'm trying to remember. I can't remember exactly what we won, but we were nominated anyway through the chamber and we went through the process of, so, so the value to me is going through the process of applying
Don and Ebony: yeah.
Mary Kate Denton: for these things, because as you're applying. For somebody, I don't, I don't have a business degree. I didn't, I didn't go to even one day of college.
I started doing hair straight outta high school. So, the process of applying for awards really helps you learn what you're doing, right. And what you're not, and what you, what you're missing out on and that kind of thing. And then it makes it, it helped make me seek more. So I we're still to this day, you know, continuing to try and expand.
Our flexibility and benefits for our team. For one thing, something more, even more to brag about. You know, I love that giving to them and taking care of them and it just gets, it gets more exciting each year that we're able to add to that.
Don and Ebony: That's awesome. You mentioned something earlier and I know we're about to wrap up, but I, I just wanna go back to, you know, you talk about your culture and your team a lot, which, which is really important. but you know, your, your structure is a little bit different than most salons you say, there's no commission and no.
No booth rental. that's how our normal salon
Mary Kate Denton: how do they get paid?
Don and Ebony: So how, what's your, what's the operations? What does that look like?
Mary Kate Denton: Well,
Don and Ebony: because I may apply
Mary Kate Denton: Yeah.
Don and Ebony: it's
Mary Kate Denton: It's honestly, To me. The other two structures are more like very common in, in the industry, in the hair industry. However, the way we pay our team is more common in the regular business industry.
Our team is all either salaried or,[00:30:00] hourly wage plus bonuses. So it's all on a bonus structure. And because we've worked that way, that helps everyone focus on like, only do you get paid more if we reach our goals, but on top of that, as you progress in your career, you're not just like having to pump out more hair to, to make more money.
Like, it's not like, oh, I've reached this stage where I'm I'm 90% booked all the time. How am I gonna make any more money? All the only, only way I can is either get more clients or. Raise raise my prices. Right? So what we do allows that person who's been in the business a long time to continue to grow beyond that, without doing more hair, without necessarily even having to raise their prices, they can continue to, to gain income and even gain fulfillment in their career because there's, there's more to do for the rest of the team.
So they can contribute in other ways besides just taking care of clients, if that makes sense.
Don and Ebony: It does. And that's, that's really nice. So when you guys came up with that, that's really brilliant.
Mary Kate Denton: with. Yeah, it helps everybody share more too, so that you're not just like, I'm a rock star, I'm on my own and on this island and I don't care about everybody else.
This helps everyone care about each other more.
Don and Ebony: Wouldn't fit over there. So I'm just saying,
Mary Kate Denton: cause
Don and Ebony: and on that note,
Mary Kate Denton: cause she's a rockstar.
Don and Ebony: Well, thank you. Yeah, Don I'll shut up. No, it is your thing. You've dealt. You've dealt with Ebony a lot today, so now it's time for the fun stuff. But I got one question to ask you. Yeah, you kind of hit on it a little bit a couple of times, but you can't get away from us without letting us.
Five years from now, what Mary, Kate, and company gonna look like?
Mary Kate Denton: Well, I
Don and Ebony: another location. Did I hear that? A
Mary Kate Denton: possibly possibly another location. Definitely bigger and better than we are today.
Don and Ebony: I love it. Bigger and better.
Mary Kate Denton: Bigger and better for sure. We have 24 chairs. So I, I still don't have that salon completely full
Don and Ebony: but you're on the west side.
Yes. You know what east side said? Come on now, Mary. Oh
Mary Kate Denton: yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Over, over the years I've had a lot of requests for that.
Don and Ebony: Excellent. Well, good. good luck to you on that. And I'm sure we'll have you back when you make that announcement that you'll be on the east. That was
Mary Kate Denton: You're you're you're rooting for us
Don and Ebony: I sure am. Now it's time to do some word association. Oh boy. I'll give you one word to gimme one word back, cuz it's not wrong cuz it's your word? You ready? Okay. Okay. Good. Leader.
Mary Kate Denton: Responsibility.
Don and Ebony: Success.
Mary Kate Denton: Fulfillment.
Don and Ebony: College.
Mary Kate Denton: Not for everyone.
Don and Ebony: There you go. Failure.
Mary Kate Denton: Blessings.
Don and Ebony: Entrepreneur.
Mary Kate Denton: Fun.
Don and Ebony: Wichita.
Mary Kate Denton: Love.
Don and Ebony: Vacation.
Mary Kate Denton: Family.
Don and Ebony: Hero.
Mary Kate Denton: Mom and dad.
Don and Ebony: Oh, Chamber. Wichita Chamber specifically.
Mary Kate Denton: Valuable.
Don and Ebony: Family.
Mary Kate Denton: Did you already say family?
Don and Ebony: No,
Oh, I said
said family. confusing me
Mary Kate Denton: the most important thing. Excellent.
Don and Ebony: Fun.
Mary Kate Denton: Necessary.
Don and Ebony: And you gotta tell the truth about this one. So beverage, oh.
Mary Kate Denton: Oh, okay. So you're saying you want my alcoholic beverage? Is that what you're saying? Oh,
Don and Ebony: I'm just saying,
Mary Kate Denton: I, well, I I'm kind of boring there. I mean, I, I like beer. I like random thing. I mean, whatever,
Don and Ebony: What's your
Mary Kate Denton: favorite, but my favorite beer, blue moon. Probably
Don and Ebony: moon. Oh yeah. What with or without the orange?
Mary Kate Denton: Oh, I like the fruit.
I like the fruit either lemon, lemon or orange is they're both good
Don and Ebony: Okay.
Mary Kate Denton: Beer. Doesn't like me though. I will say yeah.
Don and Ebony: nice. Nice. Thank you for being on the show. Truly appreciate it, E yes, we appreciate you.
And thank you again for sharing your story with us. You're truly a great story. You're a fascinating person. Well friends we've reached the end of our segment. Please make certain that you share this with your friends in your circle of influence and anyone who you may think find will find value in this till next time.
Peace.[00:35:00]