Chapter 4
Lotta checked into her hotel and spent the evening on work for her other clients, reasoning that until she met with Elin at the Snug store tomorrow, she couldn’t make any progress on that campaign.
It wasn’t until later that she remembered that all she’d eaten that day were the nibbles in the airport lounge and a tiny packet of pretzels on the plane. She was ravenous.
The hotel was only a couple of streets away from the Snug store, so Lotta walked past it on her way to find some food.
It looked very similar to other Snug stores she’d come across as a customer over the years, and it was in a great location, so she wasn’t sure why it wasn’t performing.
Anyway, that wasn’t really what she was here to find out. It was just a side-quest for Clemmie.
It was a long time since she’d last been to Oslo, and the streets were only vaguely familiar to her.
It had been the same trip as the visit to the Folk Museum, part of a pilgrimage her dad had wanted to make to Norway after his father died.
They’d visited some cousins they’d never met before or since and visited the small village in northern Norway where her grandfather had grown up.
She remembered thinking how incredible it was that people could live like that in the old days, surviving in small, scattered communities with no transport links to the cities.
Now that she was older, she had a different perspective that told her it really wasn’t that long ago, and it amazed her even more.
Sometimes she wondered what would have happened if her grandfather hadn’t felt the pull of the big city, and then taken the bigger step of leaving Norway. She might not even be here.
She settled on pizza, and carried it back to her hotel, since she’d rather eat it sat in bed than in a restaurant by herself tonight.
It had been a long day, but a fun one. Travelling like a business executive had been exciting, even if it had ended up being basically the same as how she would usually travel apart from getting free food and drinks.
If Snug hadn’t paid for the lounge, she wouldn’t have stumped up for a glass of wine at airport prices, and she probably would have made a sandwich to take with her.
The best part of her day had been meeting Mats.
He was seriously good-looking and had made her feel flustered to begin with, since she was worried she’d be inadvertently staring at him the whole time.
Luckily, the free wine had helped with that, and she’d been sorry that he’d left without asking for her number.
She chuckled to herself now as she thought back on it.
It was crazy to have thought even for a moment that he would ask for her number!
He obviously hadn’t felt the same way about their encounter as she had.
But after they’d said goodbye and she’d rushed off to the loo before her case came out, a part of her hoped he might be waiting there for her, with a smile, having thought better of letting her go.
Still, perhaps all Norwegian men were good-looking.
It was probably the exoticness of his accent that skewed her perception of him.
If he’d been English, it wouldn’t have been the same.
But it wasn’t only that. Everything about him was effortless.
He had the air of someone who was used to spending time in a business class lounge, yet what he’d told her of himself, and that his clothes had holes in, despite otherwise being very well turned out, didn’t add up.
It gave him an air of mystery that captivated her.
Even on the plane, she thought she’d felt his gaze on her.
But that was probably just the effect of the wine, on top of the adrenaline that had been coursing around her since winning the pitch on Monday.
Enough of this. She was here to launch the campaign that could define the next stage of her career, and she wasn’t about to derail that by obsessing over a man she’d spent an hour with.
She needed to have a plan for the meeting tomorrow.
What did she want to get out of it? The most important thing was going to be winning over Elin, the manager of Snug Oslo.
It was important to involve her in the process enough that she bought into it, while not relinquishing the control that was essential for Lotta to steer the project in the right direction.
With her laptop propped on a pillow, she munched her pizza with the television on low volume, just for company, while she looked through her research file, rehearsing in her head what the most important points were.
Then she closed her laptop, stacked the pillows up behind her and streamed a couple of episodes of Schitt’s Creek to help her relax.
And despite her best efforts to leave behind all thoughts of Mats, she dreamt of him.
Lotta wore her favourite dress, a deep red corduroy shirt-dress with a tie-belt and a hem that fell to mid-calf. With black tights and chunky boots, she felt comfortable and stylish and ready to take on the day, and Elin if she had to.
It was a cold, crisp day with grey skies, but thankfully no rain to contend with. After a delicious breakfast at the hotel, Lotta walked the short distance to the Snug store, arriving just as the doors were being unlocked.
‘Morning!’ she said, stepping inside. ‘You must be Elin?’
‘No, I’m Hedda. Elin will be in shortly.’
‘I’m Lotta Jansen. I have a meeting with her at ten, so I am a little early.’
‘Nice to meet you,’ Hedda said warmly. ‘Would you like a coffee?’
‘Thanks, that would be great.’ Lotta followed Hedda to the back of the store, where there was a smart kitchen area to the right of the counter with a fancy coffee machine and a small sink.
It was so tidy, and the mugs and everything else so perfectly arranged on a shelf, that it was hard to know whether or not it was part of the shop.
Even the washing-up utensils artfully placed in a pot next to the sink looked brand new, as did the cloth that was neatly folded next to the tap.
‘Latte?’
‘Yes, lovely.’ Lotta put her bag down behind the counter and watched Hedda press a couple of buttons to produce a frothy latte that filled the shop with a wonderful smell of freshly ground coffee. She made one for herself and invited Lotta to sit on one of the stools tucked underneath the counter.
‘How long have you worked here?’
‘Almost four months. I started just before Christmas. It was crazy,’ she said with a smile. ‘So busy we couldn’t keep the shelves filled.’
‘And now?’
‘It is quieter. It’s been good to have more time to learn about the business. I love the idea of giving artists a place to showcase their work.’
‘It’s a very unique concept,’ Lotta said. ‘Do you have a favourite?’
Hedda’s eyes swept the store, as if reminding herself what was there.
‘We don’t have much at the moment. I quite like those tiny vases,’ she said, nodding to a nearby shelf that had a range of small ceramic vases that would take no more than a single stem.
They were glazed with sugary pastel colours, and Lotta thought one wouldn’t be enough.
They looked very pretty as a collection, and you’d only achieve that by having three or four.
Hedda finished her coffee, washed the cup, dried it and placed it perfectly neatly back on the shelf before wiping around the sink with a cloth that she took from a drawer.
Lotta sensed their chat was over. ‘I’ll have a browse while I wait for Elin.’
She tucked her stool away and walked slowly around the shop, specifically looking for items by local makers which in other Snug stores had been easy to spot since they’d been accompanied by a small picture frame with a photo of the artist and a brief biography.
But there were only a couple here. The one beside the small vases and another with some candles.
Lotta had been hoping for a bigger pool of makers to choose from for the campaign.
The next time the door opened, it was Elin. She swept in, looking flustered. Lotta hadn’t seen her before, but it was obvious from the way she came in who she was, and confirmed by her first words, which, although in Norwegian, Lotta could understand.
‘I have a meeting with someone from head office. She’ll be here any minute, so you’ll have to manage by yourself.’
As if Hedda hadn’t already been doing that. Elin couldn’t see Lotta since she was behind a shelving unit, but also, that could have been true for any customer in the shop, and Elin had assumed there was no one else there.
‘No problem,’ said Hedda.
‘And watch what you say. They’ve said she’s here for a marketing campaign, but I think they’ve sent her to spy on us.’
Lotta tried hard to suppress a giggle but didn’t quite manage it, turning it into a cough instead, forcing her to present herself to Elin.
‘Hi, Elin. I’m Lotta Jansen from Lotta Jansen Marketing. I think you’re expecting me?’
She held out her hand and Elin took it, her face telling Lotta that she didn’t realise she’d been overheard.
‘Of course. Welcome to Snug Oslo.’ She was smiling, but the smile didn’t reach her eyes, and Lotta could tell she wasn’t going to be an easy nut to crack.
‘I was early and Hedda kindly made me a coffee. I’ve just been having a look around.’
Hedda held out her hand and nodded to Lotta’s mug. ‘Another?’
‘That would be lovely, thank you.’
Without asking Elin, Hedda made coffee for all of them, and Lotta got the impression that Hedda was less of a shop assistant than an assistant to Elin.
Once they were in the office and Lotta began to explain her concept, she soon forgot her misgivings. Elin may not be the usual friendly face you’d expect to find in a Snug store, but she engaged in the conversation and asked lots of questions. Perhaps her first impression had been wrong.
‘So ideally, we’d like you to identify one artist or maker you work with for the project. Someone who you know you can get on with and have had success with in the past, maybe someone who you think would relish the challenge and be invested in it as much as us.’
Lotta had been expecting an enthusiastic response to this, mainly because if she were Elin she’d love nothing more than diving into her contact list of makers they’d stocked before and thinking about the possibilities, but Elin shut her down.
‘It’s a quiet time of year for us. Everyone is recovering from fulfilling Christmas orders. We only have a couple of artists working with us at the moment.’
‘It could be someone you’ve worked with before,’ Lotta reminded her.
‘How about the woman who makes the small vases?’
Lotta didn’t want to dismiss the suggestion because maybe it was an excellent choice. But it wasn’t exactly considered, and she wasn’t sure Elin even knew the woman’s name. ‘Okay. What do you imagine could work? Presumably she’s done other collections before, or does she specialise in vases?’
Elin’s expression was what could only be described as stony. ‘I didn’t know what this meeting was about and I don’t have all of this information to hand.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Lotta said, pasting on her brightest smile. ‘I didn’t mean to spring this on you. It’s really a fact-finding visit to get the ball rolling. I wasn’t expecting to settle on anyone today.’
‘Good. Leave it with me then.’ Elin stood up and Lotta realised the meeting was over.
‘Right, well, thank you for your time. I’ll send you a follow-up email and perhaps let me know your initial thoughts in a few days.’
Elin gave a tight nod, held the office door open for Lotta, then closed it behind her.
‘That was quick,’ Hedda said.
Lotta was in a state of mild shock. ‘It was. I’m not sure what to do now.’
‘If there is anything I can do.’
She was torn. She was supposed to be working with Elin. The whole point was that the store managers needed to buy into the campaign and after this one, once she’d proven the concept, her own involvement would be minimal. Imagine leaving this in Elin’s hands. It wouldn’t happen.
‘Thank you, Hedda. I appreciate it. I’ll regroup and work out what to do next.’
‘They’re not really spying on her, are they?’
Lotta laughed it off. ‘Of course not! I’m a marketer, not a secret shopper.’
But when she left the store, feeling deflated at achieving exactly nothing by traipsing to Oslo for this meeting, she couldn’t help wondering whether there was more to this assignment than met the eye.