posted on September 19, 2002 06:19:01 PM new
We are one of the largest sellers of jewelry and precious metals items on eBay. We start our auctions at 1 cent, so we have excellent sellthrough.
We don't make the jewelry and we don't buy it wholesale in quantity. Where we get it or how much we pay for it is NOT open for discussion.
Every now and then some female sees one of our items and wants 8 or 10 of them as bridesmaid or shower gifts. We never have that many, and I politely apprise them of that by email. But lately, people have been demanding that we create custom items, things that we would have to craft by hand.
To wit:
[i]Hi, I am interested in buying 10 bracelets for a group of women on a committee. They have been good volenteers (sic) through-out this year and I thought a silver good fairy bracelet or something similar would be a nice gift. Would you be able to supply 10 silver bracelets with maybe a fairy charm. Would it be possible to get a discount, since I am paying for all of them? Even if you had one silver charm on a silver bracelet, if this could reduce the price, that might work. Hopefully we can work together on this.
P.S. I would need them by January, so we have time. Since you live in (omitted) and I live close, I could pick them up and save shipping.
[/i]
She wants something cheap, cheap, cheap, and I am just supposed to fabricate these things for her and wait around for her to pick them up.
Yeah, right.
This task is the kind of thing I might do for any of my really good customers, like people who watch my auctions avidly, bid like crazy and run up the totals. I have about two dozen of these folks and I cherish them. I would have to order both the bracelets and charms from a source other than my usual supplier and they would not be cheap. But I would do it for only a little over cost for any of my really good customers. It's called creating goodwill.
The fool who sent the email, though, I don't know from Eve. Why do people just presume you will do them a favor when there's absolutely no history there?
posted on September 19, 2002 06:58:24 PM new
From Fluffythewondercat:
We are one of the largest sellers of jewelry and precious metals items on eBay. We start our auctions at 1 cent, so we have excellent sellthrough.
We don't make the jewelry and we don't buy it wholesale in quantity. Where we get it or how much we pay for it is NOT open for discussion.
-------------
Who cares?
Instead of complaining about someone wanting to buy somthing from you, why don't you see if you can accomodate them. No one is holding a gun to your head, you have until January. Find something they may like and offer them a fair price, they may take it. That might be the little bit of goodwill that will make them a lifelong customer, bidding in a frenzy on your auctions.
posted on September 19, 2002 07:14:47 PM newI politely apprise them of that by email.
If you do not deal in quantity, then that's about all you can do.Just decline the request.
There is nothing more to be done. I would not let this bother me as it comes with the job so to speak.
"The fool who sent the email, though, I don't know from Eve. Why do people just presume you will do them a favor when there's absolutely no history there? "
posted on September 19, 2002 07:15:48 PM new
If it isn't profitable for you, why not just place a statement in your TOS to the fact that custom designed items are NOT AVAILABLE.
If you can quote a price for the custom items that you are happy with & the people will pay that price, go for it.
I state in my About ME section that if someone is looking for a specific item & cannot on Ebay, to let me know. I have suppliers that I can order the items from. I quote a price I'm happy with, if they want to buy it, this is the price. But again I only do it if I can make a reasonable profit on the item.
posted on September 19, 2002 07:17:55 PM newThe fool who sent the email, though, I don't know from Eve. Why do people just presume you will do them a favor when there's absolutely no history there?
Oh I don't know, she probably remembered that old saying 'It never hurts to ask'
posted on September 19, 2002 07:27:48 PM new
"She wants something cheap, cheap, cheap"
Maybe. But it would take you all of ten minutes to quote her a price you could make money at, payment up front. She would probably decline, but maybe others wouldn't.
Sounds like you aren't interested in moving up or creating good will.
posted on September 19, 2002 09:45:04 PM new
Oh, yeah, I really want to create goodwill with someone who wants me to make items for her and sell them for pennies. Oh, yeah, that's really the kind of buyer I want.
Bzzzzt.
Her email is all about cheap.
"Would it be possible to get a discount, since I am paying for all of them?"
"If this could reduce the price, that might work."
"I could pick them up and save shipping."
This from someone who can see we start auctions at one cent.
NO WAY is she going to pay anything like a reasonable price.
Are you guys going to tell me you do handsprings and cartwheels for mere pennies? For heaven's sake, WHY? Some customers aren't worth having.
posted on September 19, 2002 09:49:05 PM new
Bear 1949: I state in my About ME section that if someone is looking for a specific item & cannot on Ebay, to let me know. I have suppliers that I can order the items from. I quote a price I'm happy with, if they want to buy it, this is the price. But again I only do it if I can make a reasonable profit on the item.
Fair enough. Maybe you enjoy haggling over the price. I don't; I had enough of that in my flea market days. You can say "take it or leave it" but a certain percentage of the population think that leaves them a third option: get a better price through sheer obnoxiousness.
I told this lady (cough) who sent me the email that we don't have what she's looking for, only what's listed and she's been sending me huffy mails ever since. Seems I'm supposed to be falling all over myself trying to help her because she's an eBay bidder with 8 whole feedback.
posted on September 19, 2002 10:47:31 PM new
I thought about this some more and realized my experiences parallel that of a friend of mine.
Lovely lady, great cook, very hospitable, a hard worker. She opened her own Indian restaurant about ten years ago in an area already populated by Indian restaurants.
She had a different concept: she would cook what was fresh that day and as the spirit moved her. The result was exquisitely prepared home-cooked meals. There was no menu. You sat down, decided what you wanted to drink, and the server started bringing out food. It was an adventure.
Invariably, though, my friend would have a story for me each time I visited, and the cunning and sheer crassness of some of her customers would just take your breath away.
One couple came in with a child. The husband decided he would split his meal with his wife, and the wife would feed the child from her plate. They left in a huff when my friend told them she could not feed three people for the price of one. Perhaps Denny's allows this, I don't know.
She tried the lunch buffet approach, which worked for a short while until a man came in early one day and loaded his plates with all the chicken in the buffet (enough, she had calculated, for 40 diners). He sat down and stolidly munched his way through it all...for $5.99.
I think the capper came when one of her customers stole her car.
The only solution to these kinds of situations (except for the last one) was to institute some rules, like a minimum purchase per person and a limit on the amount of chicken one could take. It was kind of sad watching the gentle hospitality drain away to be replaced by minimums and rules....but necessary for self-preservation. Kind of like the lengthy TOSes that everyone sneers at here that have been born of necessity.
...because someone who shops at auction is by definition someone who wants the best of it, always. Okay, fine, but that doesn't mean I have to give it to them.
posted on September 19, 2002 11:57:47 PM new
fluffy: I think that you have lost touch with humanity. It is human nature to bargain & that is what this lady was trying to do via email. So you start your auctions at 1 cent, well, IMO, that sounds like you are cheap, so she thought so too. It doesn
t make a rats ass how many you sell or where you stand in the ratings. we all are subject to the frailities of human nature.
posted on September 20, 2002 12:51:55 AM new
I hear 'ya, Fluffy. I work in a retail store. This week we had a bunch of "free after rebate" items. One lady came in with our flier and started asking me to fetch EVERY free item for her. That took about 15 minutes. Then she wanted me to start telephoning our other stores to find the items we were sold out of. None of this was making any money for us. I dialed one number, gave her the phone and politely told her, "You do it." Goodwill is fine, but it's unreasonable to expect me to serve her at the expense of my paying customers.
posted on September 20, 2002 01:14:03 AM new
Oy, don't get me started on customers. This morning another associate dumped a customer on me. Customer was having trouble with her new eMachine. (I'm the computer "expert" in the store, right.) She was getting an error message at boot-up. Specifically she wanted to know how to back up her files.
I told her, "Use a Zip drive." She said she has one. Duh. What she really wanted was for me to magically fix her computer, perhaps by osmosis. Of course, she hadn't sent in the warranty, or saved her receipt. She couldn't send the machine in for repairs because she needed it to run her business. I eventually suggested she check for a firmware patch on the Web. Excuse me, if two hours on the phone with eMachines support couldn't fix her problem, how was I supposed to? Anyhoo, no big deal. She didn't buy the computer from us, and didn't buy anything in the store.
That happens all the time. Another guy wanted me to show him how to enlarge/reduce with his copier. He didn't buy it from us. Hey, genius. Read the manual! I helped him anyway. (Took me a while to figure it out, though. Meanwhile, paying customers are waiting to be helped.)
I don't mind much because I do the same thing if I have a problem. I took about 15 minutes of a gal's time at Sears, then wound up buying a clearance - half-price item for $1.50. She probably wanted to smack me. LOL
posted on September 20, 2002 07:27:17 AM new
I won't haggle over the price of special order items either. I quote a price, if they want it they pay. If you are tired of her emails, set you email filter to delete all he incomming messages.
No matter what you do, you can't please everyone, all the time.
Really it sounds like you needed to vent some anger. Hope it gets better for you.
posted on September 20, 2002 08:22:49 AM newThis week we had a bunch of "free after rebate" items
Doesn't that usually mean they have to pay for the item first? So in fact she was a paying customer.
I have 2 family members that are managers in retail and hear these stories all the time, the bottom line is customer service and if you are not willing to do that, your business will die. In retail.
Online auctions you can get away with being rude and obnoxious, to a point, and still get good feedback or no feedback. So the buyer base is still there.
posted on September 20, 2002 05:24:53 PM newI have 2 family members that are managers in retail and hear these stories all the time, the bottom line is customer service and if you are not willing to do that, your business will die. In retail.
Nobody's business is going to die because they don't spend half an hour fawning over a customer who's ONLY there to stock up on freebies. Use a little common sense. The customers who are actually BUYING something are the ones who need service.
posted on September 20, 2002 05:32:10 PM new
A lady called yesterday and wanted us to change her toner. I told her, "come on in." She purchased a toner and we installed it for her.
She thanked us profusely. She said she had called from coast to coast trying to find out how to do it. She took her copier to our competitors and they refused to perform this simple service for her.
She was very happy. We were glad to help. And we made a sale. If you worked in retail then you would understand that it's not practical to spend a half hour on a customer who's not buying anything. Not that we ignore cheapskates, but good will doesn't feed the bulldog.
posted on September 20, 2002 06:36:28 PM new
Word of mouth is bigger than what most people think.
What you did yesterday was probably made a customer for life, and she will tell all her friends and so on... however the ones that you make unhappy will also tell their friends...
It is a difficult line and I hear stories all the time. Can't please everyone... but some try their hardest.
and actually Twinsoft, you did try even though you put a limit on it, nothing wrong with that...
posted on September 20, 2002 08:01:35 PM new
Perhaps Fluffy, it would be wise to just state in your TOS that you do not welcome emails requesting special orders!!!...It does appear you are customer leary right now...Hope things get better for you!!!
posted on September 23, 2002 01:34:09 PM new
Hmmmm...
I volunteer, I also have purchased fundraising items in bulk on ebay.
I think the "it never hurts to ask" is the motto of all volunteers who spend their time and money for a good cause.
I think getting bent out of shape is a time sink, either make a deal, or move on.
BTW, I purchased 7 gross of an item, labeled them with our web address and then sold them at info tables I hosted at shows and meetings. I wasn't out to make money, but when people used the item, they would remember the name.
I did help get the word out about some wonderful folks.
I sure wasn't out to rip off any seller, but they worked a deal with me and we both had a happy ending.
Japerton
posted on September 24, 2002 03:12:07 PM new
Mme. Fluffy,
I ran into this situation sometimes at craft shows. Some established crafters didn't want to take custom orders (as is their - and your - perogative.) That left them with a choice: Ignore the request, try to sell them something else, or direct them to another crafter.
When I was just getting started, I let it be known I was not adverse to custom orders, and several of these more established crafters referred people to me. It worked out well for everyone.
One possible solution for you would be to look around to see if there are sellers you could recommend who don't mind custom orders. I don't mean wholesale sources (who probably wouldn't sell to consumers anyway) but smaller businesses who are no competition to you.
Clearly, you're not obligated to do this...but from your previous posts it seems that you're fairly customer-service oriented, and I'm getting the notion that it bothers you that you are getting these requests, and sending a simple "wish I could - can't - sorry - bye" response bothers you. A canned email with a couple of referral names (with, possibly, a disclaimer) that you can send out in response would be a favor to these customers but not too much strain on you. The only real work would be in finding the names of "refer-ees" and I'd imagine you could find those inside your own category.
Again, I'm not saying you SHOULD do this. I'm just saying you COULD...
posted on September 24, 2002 03:42:45 PM new
It's amazing the lowest 20% of profitable customers are also the most demanding. Chuck them and don't look back.
"it doesn't hurt to ask."
It also doesn't hurt for a buyer to stop pinching pennies on things that obviously are not a need. Allow sellers to make a decent living, most of us don't sell on ebay for kicks.
"Word of mouth is bigger than what most people think."
Unless one wants to attract low price customers who are very demanding, why would "fluffy.." care abut word of mouth from this buyer? Perhaps her 1¢ start bids are enough to create the word of mouth.
