Mr. Fitter on YouTube, Facebook and looks back at the past.

As I work on my current YouTube listing  (http://www.youtube.com/user/fitterfirst),  I started to think back 1 year, 5 years, 10 years and even 20 years. I am amazed at how much the way we do things has changed in such a short period of time.

This blog is a little off the cuff as much of my knowledge and experience is being documented on our Fitter YouTube page, Facebook and as links on our website. So as I consider what to share with you I decided to share some of the milestones I can recall of how technology has changed what we do each and every day in and around the Fitter headquarters in Calgary, AB.

1985- I had a phone, a calculator and a journal book.

1986-I bought a used Brother Typewriter from my first employee, Carron S.

1987 – I purchase an IBM computer from My brother Luke, but I never learned how to use it. I also purchased the rights to 1-800-Fitter1 from AGT phone company for a huge sum of money by my standards then. Monthly phone bills were in the $1,000 range of they had a monopoly and took full advantage of it.

1988 – The Olympics came to Calgary and I was swamped for a year as a volunteer on the Luge Track and as a sponsor as Fitter donated our 3-D Pro Fitter Cross Trainers to every facility that athletes would be at. It was a good idea!

1989 – The same brother Luke told me if I really wanted to have control of my business, I should get rid of the IBM and get a MacIntosh. I did. This was a very good idea too!

1989 – I also took a train to Berlin after a trade-show in Germany and took part in the tearing down of the Berlin wall. This was special.  I had very heavy suitcases on the flight home.

1990’s – We purchased our first fax machine around this time for about $2500.00 Ouch! Fed Ex had lost $85 million on the failed Zap Mail system, way more ouch for them.

1995ish- More McIntosh computers, no viruses just more power every year.

1996- This is about the time I got my first cell phone. I still have the original and it is massive.

1998- I was approached by a fellow in Florida who wanted to put all the written data and a few pictures of the ProFitter on a web site. We talked back and forth and after a month or so I decided to try it. I still have those original copies and there was no way to buy anything, but people who saw it thought it was pretty cool. For Fiter the world wide web was born.

1999- Macs again played their roll as we published our first catalog. The work was all done in house on Mac’s.

2000- It was and interesting New Years Eve because the Y2K bug threating to change the world as we knew it. I was pleased Fitter did not expect too much of an issue as we were Mac based.

2002- The web was taking off and Fitter Logo was expanded to include 800-fitter1.com. This was to link our web and phone contact info into every eye that ever saw our logo. I believe this was also the year I started using e mail.

2003- We launched a new website again and were filling online orders regularly.

2004- e-mail had taken over much of my life and we published frequent catalogs with our in house publishing programs such as Quark.

2007- We sourced and installed a complete operations system to help run Fitter Even better and leaner.

This review back on significant times and developments over the past 23 years has been very good for me. I had to dig into my memory and where I was not sure, I googled it.

I do have a an iPod and know that on Sept 11, 2001 there was no such thing. I do not have a BlackBerry or iPhone yet. I just opened my first Facebook (www.facebook.com) pages and of course I write a blog. What I am not sure of is what will the tools I will be using in 5 years from now look like and how will they work?

The only thing I seem quite certain about is that I will prefer to use the tools of the day standing, or active sitting on a ball or Active Disc, just as I have since 1995. It is nice to know some good things don’t change.