Retail & events - Artificial Reality

Interviews

The full conversations from this industry.

S2E2: The secret AI strategy this small NYC business uses to save thousands

Two co-owners of a charcuterie shop off Central Park on the AI that replaced a hire, the agency quote they refused, and the proposal that still takes three days.

2 Sep 2026

What's working

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Ten minutes to one: answering inquiries with ChatGPT

Sara Rojas cut each customer inquiry from about ten minutes to under a minute with ChatGPT, and stopped paying someone to help with the inbox.

2 Sep 2026

How an event planner prices flower arrangements with ChatGPT

A wholesale catalogue of thousands of flowers used to mean hours on the floor. Sara Rojas now sends a screenshot and gets stem counts inside a budget.

2 Sep 2026

A small business owner used ChatGPT instead of a financial planner

Sara Rojas put every balance, APR and target into ChatGPT and got a payoff order back in five minutes. She reports it replaced hiring a planner.

2 Sep 2026

What's not working

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An event proposal still takes three days, with AI

ChatGPT drafts what to write. Sourcing the rentals and laying it out in Canva is still two to three days of manual work per large event.

2 Sep 2026

The friendly draft that keeps reverting to generic

Sara Rojas gets the register she wants, then loses it. She has to re-prompt, the version she liked is gone, and nobody told her settings existed.

2 Sep 2026

When AI writes the flyer, the letters come out wrong

Luisa Ramirez uploads an image, asks for a flyer, and gets words that don't match what she typed. Her fix is to move everything to Canva.

2 Sep 2026

AI tools used

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The AI stack behind a two-owner NYC shop

ChatGPT, Sintra and Canva, split between two co-owners by job rather than by preference. What each one does at Charcuterie by Bohemian Picnics.

2 Sep 2026

What Sintra does for a small business marketing budget

Luisa Ramirez was quoted roughly $800 to $1,000 for two carousels. She now runs the marketing herself on a $37-a-month tool, and reports 20,000 followers.

2 Sep 2026

What needs to be built

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The inquiry-to-proposal tool nobody has sold her

ChatGPT plus Canva plus Pinterest, in one place, driven from the inbox. A product spec from an event planner losing three days per proposal.

2 Sep 2026

An event planner wants software that tells her what to charge

Rentals, plates, food and labour hours in; a price you can actually make money on out. Sara Rojas on the tool she wishes had existed when she started.

2 Sep 2026

Thousands of flowers, no photographs, no live stock

A catalogue of thousands, a website that shows what can be sourced rather than what's in stock, and no pictures. What a florist-facing product needs.

2 Sep 2026

Product requests

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Counting the sugar: the inventory tool a food business wants

Luisa Ramirez wants something that walks in and counts precisely — scan the shelf or weigh it. Without exact counts, she can't price a plate properly.

2 Sep 2026