PRESS RELEASE – July 17, 2024 New York, NY
Byline Harvey DiBarbidean, Conde Nast

We are at The Plaza Hotel in New York City with Jim And Karen Fletcher from Winter Garden, Florida. They just returned from a six month around the world voyage aboard the Viking Cruise Line’s Viking Sky.

Harvey – Welcome home from what must have been the trip of a lifetime. Would you do it again?

Jim – In a heartbeat. I’m ready to go right now. Viking has a fleet of “small” cruise ships. The Viking Sky is only 745 ft long and accommodates only 930 guests. It didn’t take long to feel like everybody was family. We took several cruises when we were young.

The first one was on a small ship like the Viking Sky and another was the largest one in the world. Although we enjoyed the big one, the small one was able to visit smaller ports, and allowed us to visit longer. The best part though, it felt like we were with family.

Harvey – Jim and Karen, we have many readers who wish they could take a world cruise, but do not know how to afford it. Before we agreed to do this interview you told us your story. Would you mind sharing?

Karen – Well, we met while at Lynnfield High School in Massachusetts.
He was a few years ahead of me and asked my friend and me to play pool with his friend.

I proceeded to put a hole in the pool table. We were married 5 years later after he graduated from Norwich University.

Jim – My story may be a little long for your article, but I will tie it up at the end to answer your reader’s question. I was commissioned a 2LT in the U.S. Army out of Norwich. After Armor School at Ft Knox, KY I elected to sign up for the Voluntary Indefinite program which obligated me to serve at least one extra year of active duty beyond my original two years.

This allowed me to have my orders from Vietnam changed to Frankfurt, Germany (a three year tour). I served as the Commanding Officer of HQ Detachment of the Personnel & Administration Battalion, V COSCOM. We assigned Sergeants and below to their duty stations upon arrival to Germany. My First Sergeant met his wife while invading Frankfurt with the 5th Infantry Division during WWII. I wasn’t even born yet.

Karen – It was the best time of our lives. We met a lot of friends, and traveled. We saw the Berlin Wall, East Berlin, Tivoli Gardens in Denmark, canals of Amsterdam, vineyards along the Rhine River. Oktoberfest in Munich, concentration camps of Dachau and Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria. We skied the Alps in Austria and Switzerland, toured Paris and the Normandy beaches. There are too many more to list them all.

Harvey – After the service, what did you do and why is it significant to your story?

Jim – We returned from Europe in June of 1972 and our daughter, Amy, was born on September 1st. I found a job at Data Printer Corp. in Cambridge, MA. They manufactured line printers for the high tech industry. I worked my way up from purchasing agent to materials manager. We provided all electronic components and custom fabricated parts for manufacturing.

My responsibilities included materials management, purchasing, shipping/receiving and stockroom. I was part of the team to convert from manual to computerized materials planning.
In 1977 I was recruited to Data General to procure the mechanical components of their disc drive, hard drive and printer products manufactured in Gorham, ME.

This was a time when these products were large and software was just being developed for planning. I developed a matrix to bring the most expensive purchased items in “Just inTime” to increase inventory turnover and reduce inventory. This was a new concept being touted in Japan. I loved Maine, but found DG a bit too stifling, so after a year I left to start a business in Hampton, NH with a friend of mine.

It was a lot easier to manage somebody else’s big business than my own small one, so when Wang Labs recruited me, I gave up my half of the business to my partner to work for them in Tewksbury, MA.

I managed the Mechanical Purchasing Department for Wang’s CPU, Hard Drive and PC Division. They had an inventory problem and needed to expand their manufacturing space. I submitted an idea to solve the problem which was approved. Instead of planning for and purchasing thousands of parts, receiving them, inspecting them, sending them to inventory, kitting them for the manufacturing floor and assembling them into sub-assemblies, we could just purchase the sub-assemblies directly and bring them in on a “Just in Time” basis. This is how I did it.

I worked with Manufacturing Engineering to produce drawing specifications and part lists for a bidding package. I worked with Planning for forecasts. I prepared two bidding packages. The first package was for 80% of the forecast with guaranteed regular deliveries to be adjusted on a rolling three month outlook.

The absolute best pricing was expected. The second package was for the other 20% of the forecast. The vendor would keep three weeks of finished goods on hand and deliver as actual requirements dictated for “Just in Time” requirements. A premium would be paid to this vendor. The following is what happened.

The average cost for the finished assemblies was less than the cost of the individual parts purchased separately. Receiving and inspection of individual parts was eliminated.
Inventory was eliminated. Kitting was eliminated. Subassembly manufacturing was eliminated.
Manufacturing space was freed up for expansion.

This is the part where I start tying things together. I was good at helping manage other people’s businesses, but not so much my own. Well, I left Wang to work for myself again. One of my vendors offered to sell me his business.

Two bankruptcies and several menial jobs later I moved to Florida in 2014 to help my daughter with her family. My wife stayed in New Hampshire to run her Sports Memorabilia business in Newburyport, MA. Then the bottom fell out.

My daughter, a six figure earner, was injured in an automobile accident requiring four surgeries on her back and neck. Over the next 5 years we used our retirement savings to support her family while waiting for her court case to settle.

It kept getting postponed for covid or some other reason. Her case was solid and she wanted a jury trial, but when our retirement dried up she had to settle out of court. Barely able to clear her debt, she was able to purchase a modest house and help her now adult kids get started on their own.

My wife and I still had no retirement. I still lived with my daughter. I was 76 years old and my wife 73. She still had her business, but wanted to come to Florida with us. Then a friend of my daughter told me about a gold and silver business opportunity.

My prayer was answered: I thought. I forgot about what happens when I own my own business. Then another prayer was answered. An associate of my gold and silver business told me about this Master Key Experience taught by a company in Kauai.

When I was young I had focus and imagination and then lost it. MKE helped me retrain my brain. I regained my focus and my confidence by replacing the bad habits controlled by my subconscious mind with good ones. The subconscious controls 95% of our actions. I also learned

“This power is from within, but we cannot receive it unless we give it…”

-Emerson’s Law of Compensation.

My gold and silver business became very successful. I was able to help others become successful as well. This made me extremely grateful to be of service. Also, I was able to live my heart’s desire of traveling the world on an ocean voyage adventure with my wife of 56 years.

Karen – Yes, we started in Ft. Lauderdale, FL, sailed through the Caribbean, the Panama Canal to the Pacific Ocean and north to Los Angeles with stops to many wonderful places along the way.

Next we headed for Honolulu & Kauai, Hawaii where we were able to meet the people who made it possible for us to take this trip of a lifetime, Mark J and the fabulous Davene.

There was Polynesia in the South Pacific, New Zealand and we always wanted to see The Great Barrier Reef in Australia. We sailed through Indonesia up to Vietnam (Jim always felt guilty about not going).

Singapore and Thailand were outstanding. There was the magic of India and the history of the Red Sea, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Luxor, Egypt. After sailing through the famous Suez Canal we visited Israel with tours to Nazareth, the Sea of Galilee and the Hanging Gardens on the slopes of Mount Carmel.

The Mediterranean was gorgeous. Athens, Istanbul, Sicily, Naples, Rome, Monte Carlo, Barcelona before sailing through the Strait of Gibraltar were more than worth our journey. Next we stopped in Lisbon before docking at Le Havre, France for the boat train to Paris.

The British Isles did not disappoint nor did beautiful Norway and Iceland. Finally, the last leg of journey of a lifetime took us to Greenland, Newfoundland and Nova Scotia before arriving in New York this morning.

Harvey – What a great story and message, Thank you for sharing.

Jim – One more thing Harvey and probably the most important to share with your readers. The elements of Master Key Experience should be taught in our school systems and/or universities. Much of it is taught by most religious faiths, but there are not enough faithful.