Native Operator

Everything running at Collected North

Collected North is the vintage and design store Anne and I run. Every agent I offer gets built and run here first, on our own receipts, listings and customers.

This is the full list, sorted by the part of the business each one covers, including what I am building next.

26 Running 2 Next build 2 Designed
Next build

Spoken for

A buyer sees a piece in an Instagram post, comments its code, and gets a private link within seconds. Once they confirm with their email, the piece is spoken for, and nobody else can buy it out from under them.

None of the tools on the market were safe for one-of-a-kind pieces, so I am building our own. It is a Shopify app, and once it has run cleanly on Collected North another small seller will be able to install it.

  • Built for one of a kind

    A piece is held only when the buyer confirms. If they don't confirm in time, it goes straight back on sale.

  • Every buyer becomes a contact

    Confirming takes an email address, which goes to the mailing list with consent handled properly. Today most of these buyers are only an Instagram handle.

  • One order, one box

    Everything a buyer picks up across our posts lands in one order and ships together.

  • Nobody left guessing

    Anyone who comments too late hears right away that the piece is taken, and can ask to be told when something like it comes in.

  1. 1

    Comment

    The piece's code on the post

  2. 2

    Private link

    A message with the hold page, in seconds

  3. 3

    Confirm

    Email in, piece held in their order

  4. 4

    Nudge

    An email with the checkout link before the hold ends

  5. 5

    Checkout or next in line

    Paid in Shopify, or offered to whoever is waiting

Testing on Anne's Instagram first, then Collected North's, with every hold logged so we can see confirmations, sales and lapses.

Photos

From the shutter to a finished file without a card reader or a cable.

  • Camera upload

    The camera sends each frame over Wi-Fi as I shoot, and the Mac mini pulls it in within five minutes.

    Every 5 minRunning

  • Listing photo cull

    Bursts are grouped, the sharpest frame of each is picked, and the house product look is applied before a piece is listed.

    Each batchRunning

  • Event and trip photos

    One switch on the camera sends a frame down the social path instead. It is cropped to feed and story sizes, stripped of location and camera data, and saved to Drive.

    Every 5 minRunning

  • Remote drop folder

    From a laptop or phone anywhere, I can send files straight to the mini over a private network, with nothing open to the internet.

    Any timeRunning

House style

Written rules the agents follow, so the work sounds and looks like us.

  • Writing voice

    A written guide to how I write, including the habits that make text read as AI, is applied to every draft before I see it.

    Every draftRunning

  • Brand standards check

    Documents are checked against Collected North's standards for naming, tone, colors and fonts.

    WeeklyRunning

Buying and inventory

Every piece has a cost and an ID from the moment it is paid for.

  • Purchase intake

    Anne posts what she bought in Slack. The agent records it at payment, gives every piece an ID, files the receipt and matches the card charge.

    HourlyRunning

  • Lot cards

    A box lot gets a printed card, and each piece pulled from it is costed from the lot until the lot is closed out.

    HourlyRunning

  • Buy check

    Anne drops a link before she bids, and the agent comes back with buy or pass and a maximum bid. Each dollar spent has to come back as a dollar of profit after every cost. The cost settings it reads are already built.

    Before a bidDesigned

Listing and selling

Good listings quickly, with a person approving each one.

  • Listing agent

    Anne posts photos and a few details. The agent researches the piece, asks only for what is missing, builds the listing and puts it live when she approves.

    HourlyRunning

  • Maker bios

    Research on a maker or designer, with every link checked, and a first draft for the store. It never publishes on its own.

    On requestRunning

  • eBay channel

    Pieces that do not sell on the website within a set time, and pieces that do not fit the store, move to eBay. A piece is never live in both places.

    After NovemberDesigned

Social

Drafted for each channel, and nothing goes out until I say so.

  • Social drafts

    Posts are drafted in our scheduler for Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest, each written for its own channel, and wait there for my approval.

    DailyRunning

  • Audience log

    Every comment, message and newsletter signup is logged each night alongside follower counts, so nobody who wrote in gets missed.

    NightlyRunning

Books and money

The job I would start with for most businesses.

  • Receipt capture

    Receipts are pulled from email and matched to every charge on the bank accounts, and anything without one is chased.

    NightlyRunning

  • QuickBooks booking

    Each matched receipt is booked with the document attached, and reimbursements are paired with the payments that settle them.

    NightlyRunning

  • Three-way match

    The bank, the receipt log and QuickBooks are checked against each other, and anything miscategorized or missing is flagged.

    WeeklyRunning

  • Spending and sales tax

    Spending is checked against the budget for this stage of the business, and Ohio sales tax is tracked through to the filing.

    NightlyRunning

  • Monthly cost baseline

    Recurring costs are rebuilt from the month's receipts and compared with the plan, AI usage included.

    MonthlyRunning

Office and records

Everything filed where I would look for it in six months.

  • Inbox filing

    Documents dropped in the inbox folder are named, checked for duplicates and filed.

    NightlyRunning

  • Email log

    Important email threads are filed with the matter they belong to, attachments included.

    NightlyRunning

  • Calls and texts

    Recorded conversations and business texts are summarized and filed with the rest.

    NightlyRunning

  • Document index

    One index of every document in the business, checked against what is actually on disk.

    NightlyRunning

  • Diary

    A first-person note of the day, written from what actually happened in it.

    NightlyRunning

  • Cleanup

    Old backups and leftovers are moved to an archive with a list of what moved. Nothing is deleted without me.

    WeeklyRunning

Watching the numbers

Read on a schedule that suits the data, not every hour.

  • KPI dashboard

    Site traffic, search, the path to checkout and social reach, measured against the targets for this stage of the business.

    NightlyRunning

  • Search and AI answers

    Where the store shows up in search results and in AI answers, by category and next to competitors.

    On requestRunning

  • Morning automation check

    A separate agent reads the night's runs and reports every error and gap. It fixes nothing on its own, on purpose.

    Running

How it runs

The nightly runs start at 8 pm Eastern on the Mac mini in my basement, which sits on a battery backup. The hourly agents run in the cloud. Every agent's instructions are backed up, and a person approves anything that spends money, publishes or goes out under our name.

If you want one of these for your business, I would start with one job and add the rest once it has earned your trust.

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