CablesAndKits

Happy Tuesday & Happy National Frozen Yogurt Day! Are you a frozen yogurt fan? What are your favorite toppings to add on top of your frozen yogurt?

In This Issue: Staying Connected & Intentional | Cisco 1000BASE-T SFP Module | What Are Copper Transceivers? | News to Start Your Day

---

The CK Daily – Staying Connected & Intentional

Good Morning & Happy Tuesday! Hope everyone is off to a great start to the week! We finally made it to February which means we can officially say Spring begins next month! Not that I’m counting down or anything… 😉

It’s been a nice start to the month so far. I got to attend a Gym Dogs (UGA women’s gymnastics) meet on Friday night which was a lot of fun. I also managed to soak in some sunshine over the weekend and get in a short hike near Lake Lanier which turned out to be prettier than I was expecting!

Last night I got to have dinner with one of my oldest childhood friends that I grew up with. We became friends when we were 7 years old and have maintained a friendship for decades which is something I’m truly thankful for. Last night we were discussing how you can’t make “new old friends” and how there’s something special about having people in your life who have known all the different “versions” of you and stuck by your side through all the phases and seasons of life!

I’m a huge advocate of being intentional with developing and nurturing friendships, especially in this digital age that we live in! I don’t know all the statistics but have heard that people are lonelier now than ever before. Life can get busy and it’s easy to fall into a rut of going through the motions alone, but it’s important to make time for friendship! Don’t underestimate the joy that can come from even doing the most mundane things with friends like grocery shopping!

I’ve certainly been blessed and am so thankful to have a network of people who I love and trust in my corner! How do you stay connected with your crew!?

Rebecca

---

Product Spotlights & Updates

Cisco GLC-T transceiver module is a 1000BASE-T SFP for Copper Networks. It is designed for Gigabit Ethernet connectivity over Category 5e (Cat5e) unshielded twisted pair copper cabling up to 100m link length via a RJ-45 connector. It operates at a data transfer rate of up to 1000 megabits per second (Mbps).

---

Learning Center Article – What Are Copper Transceivers?

In data centers and other high-speed networks, you often rely on fiber optics to supply enough bandwidth. Despite that, even the most advanced networks still benefit from enabling Ethernet devices. How do you reconcile the two?

---

Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• The average rate on the 30-year fixed mortgage hit 7.04% on Monday. Mortgage rates have been on a wild ride since the summer, briefly crossing to a 20-year high of 8% in October.
• NASA rover finds damaged helicopter in the middle of Mars desert. Read more here.
• Country music star Toby Keith has passed away early Tuesday. He was 62.
• For the second year, Sour Patch Kids is bringing back its Black Raspberry Sour Hearts. The dark hearts come in a black box with two naughty Sour Patch Kids fighting over your broken heart. The candies are available in a giftable heart-shaped box.

Happy Monday! We hope everyone had a wonderful weekend and has a wonderful week ahead. Who’s excited that the groundhog didn’t see its shadow? Early spring, here we come!

In This Issue: Free Shipping 📦 | Plug Adapter C20 | All About Media Converters | News to Start Your Day

---

The CK Daily – Free Shipping 📦

Happy Monday!

I’ve been doing a lot more online shopping lately for clothing and random everyday products and I noticed something about the experience. I purposefully filter by free shipping and look for free shipping thresholds. I definitely try to be a frugal shopper and will look for deals, but I also know that shipping costs do weigh heavily on the buying process.For example I bought a floor lamp for $39 with free shipping, but there was a similar product on another site for $30 with $8 shipping and I just bought the $39 with free shipping (I know I could’ve saved $1) but I’d rather have free shipping than not free shipping even if the totals are around the same. There’s something comforting about it and it makes a world of a difference to me.

Did you know that CablesAndKits offers free shipping for over $39? I think that’s a steal! On other sites I’ve shopped, I’ve seen thresholds at around $99 and even up to $300. Does shipping weigh into your buying process?

I hope you have a great day and a wonderful week!

Cris

---

Product Spotlights & Updates

A compact solution to convert a standard 15 Amp, 125 Volt NEMA 5-15 male plug into a compatible fit for IEC C20 female outlets or connectors. Enhance your power connectivity with this durable and reliable adapter for versatile setups.

---

Learning Center Article – All About Media Converters

Simple networks come with a lot of advantages. You don’t have to check compatibility from one component to the next. Everything can run at the same speed. You spend less money. It’s all nice, but there’s a catch. The simplest networks are not the most powerful.

---

Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• McDonald’s restaurants in the U.S. are now serving improved versions of the chain’s famous burgers. The company made small tweaks that led to a noticeably more flavorful burger.
• Amazon added new disclosures around climate change to the risk factors section of its annual filing. The company said climate change could cause its operating results to fluctuate as a result of higher costs tied to things such as transitioning to “a low-carbon economy.”
• Walt Disney World executives confirmed that they will revive one of the attractions at the park —”Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser.”
• Spotify has signed a new multiyear deal with Joe Rogan, host of popular podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience.” The show was previously exclusive to Spotify, but the company said it will now be available on additional platforms.

Happy Friday! The weekend is here – do you have plans? We hope it’s a great one! 😎

In This Issue: Homemade Biscuits 🧑‍🍳 | Cisco 3560X/3750X 715WAC Power Supply | The Right Ethernet for the Right Network | News to Start Your Day

---

The CK Daily – Homemade Biscuits 🧑‍🍳

Happy Friday, folks! I recently started making homemade biscuits for my family each Saturday morning. This brings my family together for breakfast each Saturday morning before we embark on our weekend plans. After only a few weeks, my kids are looking forward to this time each weekend!

I didn’t expect how much fun I would have exploring different recipes. I initially reached out to some family members to get a recipe, and to my surprise, all recipes were different. So, I turned to YouTube for more recipes, and I found that there are plenty of ways to make biscuits! And everybody claims their way is the only way. 😂

Since I had never made biscuits, I was willing to try different recipes to see which turned out the best. It became an experiment to find out my family’s favorite recipe. As each week passes, the biscuits are getting better and better! I’ve found the following five ingredients create the biscuits we enjoy the most: all-purpose flour, sea salt, baking powder, butter, and buttermilk.

Do you have a favorite biscuit recipe? I’d love to try out more recipes!

Have a great weekend!

Chris

---

Product Spotlights & Updates

The Cisco 3560X/3750X 715 WAC Power Supply is an enterprise-class of standalone and stackable switch and comes with an 8-foot black cord for operability. It offers high levels of energy efficiency, ease of operation, security, scalability, and availability.

---

Learning Center Article – The Right Ethernet for the Right Network

An efficient Ethernet cable management plan, especially in high-density and challenging network environments, increases the versatility of network maintenance and operation. It also contributes to the system’s uptime and lowers operation cost, which makes your life a whole lot easier!

---

Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• Lululemon will debut its first men’s footwear line and will soon offer a new casual and performance sneaker designed specifically for men.
• Universal Music Group and TikTok began Thursday the process of removing the label’s song library from the social media platform after the two entities failed to come to an agreement over what UMG alleges is unfair pay for its artists’ work.
• Meta will pay a 50-cent dividend, its first ever, and has authorized a $50 billion share buyback.
• Japan’s historic SLIM moon lander has powered down ahead of a likely mission-ending cold lunar nighttime — but not before grabbing some final images and loads of science data. Read more here.

Happy Thursday! Embrace the joy of today and savor the sweet moments because it’s not just any Thursday—it’s National Dark Chocolate Day! 🍫 Indulge your taste buds in the rich, velvety goodness of dark chocolate.

In This Issue: Figuring out the Figure Outables | Cat6 RJ45 110 Type Keystone Jack | Understanding Ethernet Cable Gauge (AWG) | News to Start Your Day

---

The CK Daily – Figuring out the Figure Outables

Howdy folks, Craig here. I’ve previously written about my time away from CK and what brought me back into the day-to-day. At this point in the story (Sept 2023), we’d been losing money for months due to revenue being significantly down (up to 50%) and we had no idea why. The revenue left in the middle of the night and didn’t even leave a note!

I called a meeting with 4 people on the revenue side of the business on Thursday, Sept 28th 2023. Product, Marketing, and E-comm people. At that meeting, I said I was stepping back in so we could all put our heads together to:

1. Figure out what the heck happened
2. Fix it
3. Prevent it from happening again

Pretty simple right? Lol.

But the truth is, it kinda is that simple.

I didn’t say it was EASY, I said it was SIMPLE.

The truth is, business is like a factory or a machine that makes a product. Raw materials go in, things happen, and a finished product comes out. A business is a series of processes that, when executed well, will turn efforts into profits that keep the whole thing going, and hopefully growing, to the benefit of it’s owners, staff, customers, and community.

Let’s get into “how the sausage is made” in our business (or any e-commerce business for that matter).

In a business like ours, the process is broken down into 4 CRITICAL components:

• Engage ‘Em – People need to be aware of your existence. Adwords, Google SEO, Social Media, and other advertising. Word of Mouth / Referrals are also very important. We’ll never get a site visitor if they don’t even know we exist.
• Get ‘Em – When a potential customer lands on our site, they need to quickly understand what we do and why it should matter to them. They should quickly find the product or service that solves a problem, and it should be easy and compelling for them to click the add to cart / checkout button. If we cannot compel site visitors to buy, we are a museum not a business.
• Keep ‘Em – Once a customer chooses to do business with us they should have been so “wowed” by our delivery, product, customer service, and of course the little package of M&M’s in the box, that they couldn’t imagine going anywhere else the next time they have a need for a product or service we offer. This is what GROWS a business.
• Grow ‘Em – Once we have a loyal customer we should be looking for ways to expand the amount of business we do with that customer. What products do we offer that they are not aware of? What products do they buy elsewhere that we do not sell, that perhaps we should? Does the customer need a sales rep to help navigate the complexities of their projects and purchasing processes? By engaging with the customer at a higher level of complexity we are solving much bigger and more important problems. This is where customers tend to think of us as a “partner”.

As we began to dig in and take an honest look at the business we started to realize where we were weak, mediocre, pretty good, and strong.

Then we got to work.

More to come!

Craig

---

Product Spotlights & Updates

The CablesAndKits Cat6 110 Type Keystone jack supports both T568A and T568B wiring with a 4 x 4 termination layout. To terminate use a 110-punch-down tool. This keystone jack is 8P8C and is completely backward compatible with lower-rated cables including Cat5e.

---

Learning Center Article – Understanding Ethernet Cable Gauge (AWG)

When you have to put a network together, you’re going to compare a lot of different components to try to squeak out better performance without spending obscene amounts of money. Because of that, you’re likely to consider using Ethernet for many (if not all) parts of your network.

---

Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• SeaWorld Entertainment, Inc. is to undergo a name change. The Orlando-based theme park chain company announced it will be known as United Parks & Resorts Inc., effective Feb. 12.
• Krispy Kreme launched its all-new Dough-Notes Collection. The four heart-shaped doughnuts are designed to be decorated with personalized messages
• Mastercard is launching a new generative artificial intelligence model to allow banks to better assess suspicious transactions on its network.
• Walmart is planning to open more than 150 of its large-format stores over the next five years. Some of the locations will be converted, but the majority will be new.

Happy Wednesday! We’ve hit the middle of the week. Hang in there, the weekend is right around the corner!

In This Issue: Personality Tests | RJ45 Crimp Tool | Bidirectional or BiDi Transceivers Explained | News to Start Your Day

---

The CK Daily – Personality Tests

Happy Wednesday!

I hope everyone is having a great week. Ever had conversations that sparked a pretty in-depth internal reflection? Over the past week, it seems lots of conversations have come up in my personal and professional life that have sent me down quite the trail of reflecting on who I am personally, who I am professionally, how I work, how I respond, how I react, etc.

I don’t know about you, but I used to be obsessed with taking all the personality tests that I could find. And there are a TON! At one point in my life, I felt like I was so into them that I was defining myself and changing who I was by what they said. There may have been some things that were like me already, but if there were other things – it kind of felt like I’d adapt to be right on par with them. Because of that, I stopped taking personality tests.

Anywho, the reflection moments I’ve been having recently have made me rethink about all those personality tests. They used to really control me or guide who I was – kinda nuts to think about that. But I’ve gone through quite a few significant life changes and events over the past year. Because of these things, there are moments when I realize that I’ve changed/grown. How I would have responded before, in certain situations, is not how I find myself responding or reacting now.

Do you enjoy personality tests? Which are your favorites? Have you been spending time reflecting this year on yourself personally and professionally? If you have, I hope that your reflections have been fruitful.

Have a good rest of the week!

Ashley

---

Product Spotlights & Updates

This RJ45 crimp tool was designed with a built-in stripping blade to cut or strip the wire. This product will work with Cat5, Cat6, and Cat6A RJ45 ends.

---

Learning Center Article – Bidirectional or BiDi Transceivers Explained

Fiber optics are great for achieving extremely fast networks. They’re also essential for very long networking connections that extend multiple kilometers in total distance. If the latter is important for your operation, then SFP is likely the fiber optic connection that you will need.

---

Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• SpaceX signed a deal with Starlab, the private space station joint venture of Voyager and Airbus, to launch on the company’s Starship rocket. The station is one of several currently in development by U.S. companies, as NASA prepares to retire the International Space Station in 2030.
• Walmart announced a three-for-one stock split. The company said the additional shares will be payable after the market closes Feb. 23 to shareholders of record as of the previous day.
• Starbucks has two new seasonal menu items for you to love this Valentine’s season, launching Tuesday, January 30, and available while supplies last. Read more here.
• The first fully Pixar-themed hotel in the United States officially opened at Disneyland resort on Tuesday. The 15-story hotel overlooking Disney California Adventure Park, which was previously Disney’s Paradise Pier Hotel, was recently reimagined into the Pixar-themed hotel.

Happy Tuesday & Happy National Plan for Vacation Day! We’re almost a full month into 2024, so it’s the perfect time to start planning your next trip! Do you have an upcoming trip planned?

In This Issue: A Local Atlanta Hike | Cisco Aironet Deployment Kit | What is a Cat8 Ethernet Cable and How is it Different? | News to Start Your Day

---

The CK Daily – A Local Atlanta Hike

Good Morning & Happy Tuesday! Hope everyone is enjoying these last few days of January! It feels like the month that never ends with all the cold, dark, dreary days so I’m definitely excited to welcome February on Thursday!

We had quite a bit of rain last week and Saturday ended up being a total rainout which meant lots of time at home, but I was able to get outside for a hike on Sunday which is always such a mood booster! This time, instead of ice, we encountered LOTS of mud!

Normally we love to head up to north Georgia or the surrounding states for hikes with beautiful mountain views, but this time we decided to head into Atlanta to explore the East Palisades Trail which is a 4.2 mile trail that runs along the Chattahoochee River and leads to a magical little bamboo forest! We hiked this one a couple of years ago during the summertime and everything was lush, green, and beautiful. It definitely gave “Jungle Book” vibes and the reel we posted on it ended up going viral. It seemed like a lot of people were surprised to learn that this hidden gem exists right in Atlanta’s own backyard!

This time around it was a lot colder and far less beautiful due to hiking it in the dead of winter, but we still had a great time and the bamboo forest was still really fun to see! If you’re local, it’s worth checking out if you are looking for a quick day hike! It has a bit of elevation, but it’s definitely a family-friendly hike. Just be sure to follow the maps closely as it is VERY easy to get lost along the way due to lots of intersecting trails!

Hopefully, we’ll be blessed with a few warm days in February for getting outside and exploring!

Rebecca

---

Product Spotlights & Updates

This is a complete accessory kit for the Cisco Aironet access points. Each kit will include every part that is needed to deploy an access point. This kit does not include antennas, This is designed for access points with internal antennas.

---

Learning Center Article – What is a Cat8 Ethernet Cable and How is it Different?

Cat8 is the most modern, fastest Ethernet cable standard available today. Although Google tried to make fiber optics the standard for home internet connections, Ethernet has maintained a presence, and every few years new iterations are released that offer better performance. Let’s see how Cat8 stacks up to previous iterations of Ethernet.

---

Today’s News to Start Your Day:

• UPS fell short of Wall Street revenue estimates Tuesday, reporting drops in shipping volume, both internationally and domestically. The company also announced 12,000 layoffs as part of an effort to align resources in 2024.
• Starbucks is launching its Oleato drinks in all U.S. stores today! The beverages, named Oleato, debuted in Italy in February 2023 after former CEO Howard Schultz visited the country and noticed locals drinking olive oil daily.
• Netflix co-founder and executive chairman Reed Hastings has gifted two million shares of the streaming giant, according to a regulatory filing, with a current value of more than $1.1 billion.
• Tom Brady is merging his health and nutrition and apparel brands with Nobull. Brady will become the No. 2 shareholder of Nobull.