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Hi Heads. I get a call this morning from a "co-ordinator" of an up-coming athletic tournament. He says that he has corporate sponsorship for his event...about 20 or so sponsors. He wants a banner made thanking his sponsors, about 4' x 10' to be hung in the entrance lobby where this tournament is to take place. No logos involved, just a listing of the 20 or so benefactors...how much??? The event is a week from today.
I quote him a price, then he inquires as to how much will I discount the price if he ALLOWS me to put a small signature in the lower right hand corner indicating that we made the banner. He says that his "Corporate Sponsors" will see the name and will then call me for more work of a similar sort....right! As if they'd even bother to read or remember it. I politely tell him that we routinely add a signature sticker to banners and other signs that we produce, without having to provide a "discount" for doing so, and that many other businesses also do likewise.
At that point I heard the sound of the phone being slammed in my ear.
Oh well, another day, and another new twist to the fine art of begging.
------------------ Ken Henry Henry & Henry Signs London, Ontario Canada (519) 439-1881 e-mail kjmlhenry@home.
Some days you get to be the dog....other days, you get to be the fire hydrant.
posted
Ken, please call us!?!>.............I wanna do it too!
------------------ St.Marie Graphics & Makin' Tracks Sound Studio Kalispell, Montana stmariegraphics@centurytel.net http://www.stmariegraphics.com 800 735-8026 We're chiseling every day of the week! :^)
posted
You could also add that the your company name on the banner reflects the low price you already gave him, otherwise it will be more. (playing his game)
------------------ Artworks Olympia WA
Posts: 797 | From: Olympia, WA | Registered: Nov 1998
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I will never forget a customer who called me to ask about prices. I told him. He then told me I am WAY too high. I said thanks for calling and hung up. He called back and said "how dare you think you can get away with charging those prices!" and he hung up on me. He called yet another time, and starting rambling on ....... and I hung up on him. He called back and said "How dare you hang up on me" guess what???? I did it again! (tee hee)
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When I get customers like that, I call em back and tell em to come over to the shop so's I can WHUP em! People like that need the ever lovin' sense smacked into em! Smack em right on the lips! Make their lips swell up like a carp, and then let em try and say sumthin! That's what I say! SMACK em!
This message brought to you by the society to start smackin' people.
------------------ John Deaton III Deaton Design 109 N. Cumberland Ave.,Harlan, Ky. 40831 606-573-9101
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When you smack'em, is that the same as when you whup'em? Is it OK to give'em a thrap b'tween the eyes? That wouldn't make their lips swell up like a carp, though, would it. But if you thrap'em b'tween the eyes just right, they go all crosseyed, and their mouths flop open like a catfish, and that's almost as good. From the Thrap Between The Eyes Chapter of the Society To Start Smackin' People.
------------------ "A wise man concerns himself with the truth, not with what people believe." - Aristotle
When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro. - Raoul Duke (Hunter S. Thompson)
Cam Finest Kind Signs 256 S. Broad St. Pawcatuck, Ct. 06379 "Award winning Signs since 1988"
Posts: 3051 | From: Pawcatuck,Connecticut USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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I had a run in with this little old lady last spring......she was major B....! I did a sandwich board for her and then she asked me to give her some prices on a hanging sign all handpainted. I did provide her with pricing and then I never heard a word. A few months later I see this terrible coroplast sign stuck up on the side of her building. I was suprized, but never thought much of it. Recently I was chatting with the other sign company in town and this womens name came up. He said that she too had asked him to price a hanging painted sign for her. When he gave her the price she yelled "Your just as expensive as that other B....! I laughed my head off when I heard this! I don't mind being known as expensive...it actually weens out the guys always looking for a deal and gives the others the impression that I'm worth it. We can't make everyone happy....sometimes we have to find the humour in other peoples lack of "class".
------------------ Brenda Beaupit Classic Graphics Kemptville, Ont CANADA
Posts: 346 | From: Stittsville, ON | Registered: Dec 1998
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You folks are way to radical, here. What you should have done is given a little discount, get the money, then put your shop logo on the dominant 1/4 of the banner, just like Coke or Pepsi does when they give out those freebies to every peckerwood who ever thought about drinking that crap. When he calls for an explaination, then you hang up.
jnsigns@onlink.net Chapleau, Ontario home of "The World's Largest Game Preserve" Spring is upon us,in Shania Country. Farewell snow,here comes the mosquito!
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I wish to have it put on record that I am NOT a violent person. I do not consider a thrap between the eyes as violence, but educational. Now a ball-peen hammer between the eyes, now that's different.
This reminds me of a story. I knew a man from Block Island naned Fred Benson, who was possible the most loved and respected person there. He had come to the Island in 1906 as an orphan, a "bound boy" it was called, essentially an indentured servant to a farm family. Over the century plus two of his life, he worked as a fisherman, a mechanic, a boatbuilder, a high-school shop teacher, an author of two books of Island history, and in later years (up to age 99) as the Island representative of the Registry of Motor Vehicles for the State of Rhode Island. Physically he was a stocky, barrel-chested man, tremendously strong, yet invariably gentle, mannerly and even tempered.
When his health began to fail (for him!) at age 100, he moved to a nursing home in North Kingstown, Rhode Island. There he shared a room with another fellow, a mere lad of eighty eight. The roomate apparently had a bad habit of tossing his soiled underwear on the floor. Fred objected to this, as he had frequent visitors, and this became a point of contention. The story is that the roomate said he wasn't going to be ordered around by a n****r (Fred was African American) and Fred - who was by now confined to a wheelchair - hit him (gave him a "thrap between the eyes"). A friend who related this story to me, said he expressed shock at hearing this news, and Fred's response was, "Well, I didn't want to do it, but I couldn't see that I had a choice. You know, I haven't had to hit anybody in at least eighty-five or ninety years, but I guess I made an impression. We're good friends now."
Fred Benson passed away three years ago, at age 102. I'm proud to have known him, and I miss him.
------------------ "A wise man concerns himself with the truth, not with what people believe." - Aristotle
When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro. - Raoul Duke (Hunter S. Thompson)
Cam Finest Kind Signs 256 S. Broad St. Pawcatuck, Ct. 06379 "Award winning Signs since 1988"
Posts: 3051 | From: Pawcatuck,Connecticut USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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posted
Hey John, I really prefer to wop-em upside da head. Does that qualify me as a member of the Smack'm Society. I've found that a little rattle to the brain seems to help the organ function a little better. (and even when it doesn't work,I feel a damn site better.) Can I join, can I huh?! Cam, Can you describe this technique called "thrap"? It sounds like it could be of some value to me. Is it open handed, closed fist, etc. I assume it's a jab and not a round-house kinda thing. hehe, this is fun jus' thinkin bout it! ------------------ Bill Dirkes Bethel Hill Signs Butler, Ky. Goodnight Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are.
[This message has been edited by Bill Dirkes (edited May 26, 2001).]
Posts: 591 | From: Bellevue,Ky. US | Registered: Aug 1999
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posted
Last Friday, I had a guy who worked at my coffee house ask me to quote two big butt banners, to hang outside for a week, to promote a cookout they had had today. I told him they should be right under $500 for the pair.
He coughed and sputtered.
I asked him what his budget was.
He said $50 for the pair.
I said that's like me throwin a couple of quarters on the table and expectin you to make me a fancy steak dinner...and by the way, your tip is in that as well.
(It would have cost me $45 to pay for the banners, not includin time/travel. That would leave $5 for my services. Woohoo!)
When this conversation first started, this guy who thinks he knows everything, kept butting into our conversation and followed us out to measure the area they would go and kept insisting that a paint store drop cloth would fit the bill, not only that, he garaunteed he would buy them after the shindig was over to use as standard drop cloths. I told perspective customer (this was last friday) "...it's 4:30 (pm) the supply house closes at 5pm...tell me now or wait till monday to place the order."
The perspective customer buys two drop cloths, some stencils, and some spray paint.
He spent his whole weekend and the first part of the week on this.
He leaves the "p" out of the word "employee" on one of the "banners."
Yesterday, the day before the big shindig, he bungey cords the good one up and asks me how to fix the other...hehehe.
I told him, that's why he's gettin paid the big bucks to do the job...snicker, snicker.
Stopped by after the big winds from the Canton/Cherokee tornado storm thingie we had yesterday aftrnoon, and every body told me that the "banner" was thoroughly shredded by the wind into ribbons floating to infinity and beyond.
Never saw the other banner go up...the first one was up for a few hours. I mentioned that mine didn't rip, paid my tab and left.
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I fergot to mention that they used a funeral home awning over the grill with the name of the funeral home over it...facing the traffic. This was the only signage celebrating the event.
They went out of their way to save money by not getting appropriate signage.
Oooooooooh.
I went out to dinner with hubby and he went home, I had time to kill before my daughter needed a ride home from work...so I went to play pool. Stopped in for a cup of coffee on the way home, they were giving away hotdogs, and the fixings, just to get rid of it all before it went bad. They lost more money on what they did to pull the shindig off than they would have spent with proper signage. It was pathetic. Drivin by, it looked like a funeral. Normally three folks runnin the place, a dozen employees were standing around for 8 hours, in the sun, by a funeral awning. The grill kinda looked like a casket. If they haven't learned by now, will they ever?
(I really think I done Pat King and Joe Rees proud just now!)
OK? High five each other and lets try and save the planet with signs!
Hehehe!
Now Stevo is smiling.
Bloke, turn the prawns, yer not in Louisiana!
Si, feed Byrd, turn on headtv, and get some california sunsets, while we still can, hehehe!
Man! I really love you guys...yer the fun people in my world! (I have teenagers all around me, a bit too much,I think.) I feel like i'm trapped in a sitcom some days. It's chaotic, yet entertaining hehehe! Thanks for being patient with my shortcomings, as I was not able to...to quote Douglas Adams, "...floated in the air like a brick could not." Ok, ok, subquote, whatever, you get the idea!
Nevermind, been up for two days runnin here... bye.
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I've had many a people call me or come in & tell me there looking for the cheapest price on whatever, I tell them their wasting my time & theirs. I can't match other shops prices because they can't match my quality would they like me to give them a name & # to a Cheap Quickie Sticky Shop? They say NO i want quality but at a cheap price, That doesn't exists I say you either get CHEAP OR QUALITY MAKE UP YOU MIND because I've got to get back to work on signs for people who care about quality & not price. I'm not exaggerating I swear this is what I say & sometimes ever more harsh it depends on their attitude. You give me a little attitude & you'll get a lot more in return.
I just promoted George to sales. I'm gonna put a sign that says SALES on the door leading out to our back yard. Six foot high fence encompasses what's known as "Outback." I can call this my "Aussie Division."
We'll see how far the price gougers get with that overgrown beast that I call a puppy!
Oops, a dingo got my customer!
Too bad I didn't have a mahl stick with me the other day, "Have a seat sir, whilst I go measure the area to be signed." hahahaha!
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A couple years ago a friend called me to say there was a guy on TV who needed a sign real bad. So there was a guy getting media & cop attention parked on a freeway overpass in L.A. and he had a big piece of black plastic that he'd painted up and laid down on the pavement, knowing he'd have helicopter / television advertising. He'd placed a few weights on the corners, but the wind kicked them up and you couldn't make out the message. This guy had bombs in the car with him - and eventually committed suicide on live TV. As important as his message should have been to him to get delivered - more than life itself - you'd think he would have put a little more effort into the installation, at least. Maybe he felt the last, and most important thing he wanted to do in his life was to save a few bucks?
Too many morons - not enough bombs
------------------ "If it isn't fun, why do it?" Signmike@aol.com Mike Languein Doctor of Letters BS, MS, PhD ___________________
You know what BS is, MS is More of the Same, and it's Piled Higher and Deeper here
hehehehe
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