Marketeers and salespeople often use the phrase “think outside the box”. And when the phrase is used in that way, I usually think of clever, creative marketing and promotional stuff.
People involved in the day to day operation of rental properties, tend to think in more practical and pragmatic terms. Heaters need to be fixed, sewer drains need to be unclogged. Drain augers exist in a world that is somehow outside of any box/unbox metaphor.
However, one of the finest real world examples of thinking outside the box I have ever experienced, came from a low budget contractor during a kitchen renovation.
The tenants had left the property, a single family home, in sorrowful condition. The kitchen had to be gutted.
Our low budget contractor had managed to salvage a rather nice granite countertop from somewhere else. No, I didn’t ask where. I’m not sure I wanted to know the details.
One little problem though, the countertop was just about three inches too long to fit in our subject property’s kitchen. And the contractor did not have any tool that could be trusted to safely and cleanly make a straight cut in the granite to lob off those excess inches.
The solution? The kitchen wall at the side, abutting the short side of the countertop — He cut a slot 
in the drywall, to allow those extra three inches of countertop to just simply slide into the wall. Then he patched up the slot, sealed the wall and caulked it. Done!
My marketing friends will probably find a slogan here “Don’t Cut The Granite, When You Can Cut The Wall!” And that’s great, take from it what you will.
I personally learned a subtle little lesson about making things work. A true moment of epiphany, if you will. And if I could create a new topic category here on BHB, I would create one titled: “Epiphany”.
The Black Pearl Award this week goes to Set Godin for 
