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Thread: Jumping through hoops

  1. #16
    The other day while typing into Frontpage2000 "sorry, I can no longer take on award, trophy, plaque or most personalization jobs" for my webpage, the phone rings...

    "Hi! I'm wondering what you'd charge to engrave plates for some awards we're having made up?"

    == what kind of plates, plastic, metal, size?

    "Oh, regular sized, and metal."

    == [groan]== ok, like brass, 1" x 3"--

    "yes, brass would be good, and they need to be 1" x 6".

    ==['regular size', lol]== Ok, that sounds easy enough--

    "so how much to engrave them if I bring the plates in once I find some?"

    == I can make the plates, that's no problem...

    "Oh, great! Well everyone else wants like $7.50 each, and..."

    === is that just for the engraving?

    "umm, that's with the plate..."

    ==[so why were you going to bring me plates if everyone else quoted WITH plates? hmm]== well, $7.50 is about right for that size-

    "Oh, well, that was a little more than I was hoping to spend".

    ==[of course it is]== Ok, so how many plates do you need?

    "There will be 16 plates."

    == Ok, let me see, [calculator time], I'll do all 16 for $75, that's just under $5 each.

    "Ok, that should work, I think the others will go for that."

    == It's a fair price, yeah...

    "OK then, so I'll have 2 names at the end of month, and 2 more names at the end of May......... "

    AAAGGGHHHH!!!!!



    ========================================
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  2. #17
    Kev, tell them you will rent them the equipment to do it. Then keep a couple of of those hand held anti theft name buzzer things on hand with some calligraphy books.

  3. #18
    About a month ago, on a Saturday, the phone rang. I didn't answer it because we were technically closed. Three of us were there working on a rush job. The last person in didn't lock the door. We heard the alarm chime go off, meaning someone came in. The other two people went up front to talk to them. They wanted 2 champagne glasses, a cake slicer, and a knife for a wedding. We priced it out and they left, saying they would bring the stuff in the following week.

    First, who calls, gets an answering machine, then gets in the car and drives there? (Not me!)

    The guy brings in the stuff and says "No hurry, the wedding isn't until May 2018". I typed that right. 2018.

    She starts calling 2 days later wanting to know when they can pick them up. She didn't give up. She wouldn't stop calling.

    Seriously? 13 months before your wedding and you HAVE to have these by Friday?
    Lasers : Trotec Speedy 300 75W, Trotec Speedy 300 80W, Galvo Fiber Laser 20W
    Printers : Mimaki UJF-6042 UV Flatbed Printer , HP Designjet L26500 61" Wide Format Latex Printer, Summa S140-T 48" Vinyl Plotter
    Router : ShopBot 48" x 96" CNC Router Rotary Engravers : (2) Xenetech XOT 16 x 25 Rotary Engravers

    Real name Steve but that name was taken on the forum. Used Middle name. Call me Steve or Scott, doesn't matter.

  4. #19
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    I managed a plasma donation center for over 10 years. We opened late on Mondays for over 7 years. Sign on door, times on website where the donor made their appointments. On the phone message. We still had people call constantly from 7am to 11am when we opened. And if you happened to answer it, it was invariably a current donor who knew our hours. And they would show up at the door! People are strange
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  5. #20
    Join Date
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scott Shepherd View Post
    Seriously?

    Last Friday afternoon, a customer leaves 10 cases of product at our back door without us knowing. Someone went to take the trash out and couldn't open the door. I came in Saturday to an email about it with the file. Needs them by Tuesday. I look at the items and the files. It's 43 hours of work. No notice, no nothing, just drop them off and email.

    Had a guy come in yesterday, had items he wanted engraved. Keeping in mind, this is Friday. He said "I need them no later than Tuesday". I had to laugh inside as he walked out the door and said "Have a nice weekend". I thought to myself "What weekend? I'll be working on your items to get them to you by Tuesday".

    In 10 years, I've never seen it like this.
    Scott, you seem to be too kind for doing such orders.I would not if I had other orders to do.

    For all my 9 years being in this business and every time somebody came saying " I need it tomorrow, please help me" via email I was regretting trying to help them every single time at the end.


    I spent a significant amount of time replying to their emails, making proofs and pushing normal customers to the end of the queue and that's only to see these rush customers disappear. I cannot even recall a single time when such a rush customer actually placed their order. And that's happened to me 20-30 times over 9 years.
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  6. #21
    No good deed goes unpunished.
    Red Bolt Laser Engraving
    Houston, Texas

  7. #22
    I can safely say that much of the reason I have the clientele I have, is because I've always done my best to get jobs finished on time, no matter the time frame.

    But there's a difference between helping someone out of a genuine crisis, and being taken advantage of. I do have my share of customers that used to bring work 1 to 2 weeks in advance, and after a rush job or two, now they're ALL rush jobs. To expound on what Steve says, I just love when after doing a gottahavitnow-waste-a-good-Saturday rush job, I get call 4 months later: "we're installing these plates and we just noticed"..... You're just NOW installing them??
    Last edited by Kev Williams; 05-01-2017 at 1:35 AM.
    ========================================
    ELEVEN - rotary cutter tool machines
    FOUR - CO2 lasers
    THREE- make that FOUR now - fiber lasers
    ONE - vinyl cutter
    CASmate, Corel, Gravostyle


  8. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by Kev Williams View Post
    The other day while typing into Frontpage2000 "sorry, I can no longer take on award, trophy, plaque or most personalization jobs" for my webpage, the phone rings...

    "Hi! I'm wondering what you'd charge to engrave plates for some awards we're having made up?"

    == what kind of plates, plastic, metal, size?

    "Oh, regular sized, and metal."

    == [groan]== ok, like brass, 1" x 3"--

    "yes, brass would be good, and they need to be 1" x 6".

    ==['regular size', lol]== Ok, that sounds easy enough--

    "so how much to engrave them if I bring the plates in once I find some?"

    == I can make the plates, that's no problem...

    "Oh, great! Well everyone else wants like $7.50 each, and..."

    === is that just for the engraving?

    "umm, that's with the plate..."

    ==[so why were you going to bring me plates if everyone else quoted WITH plates? hmm]== well, $7.50 is about right for that size-

    "Oh, well, that was a little more than I was hoping to spend".

    ==[of course it is]== Ok, so how many plates do you need?

    "There will be 16 plates."

    == Ok, let me see, [calculator time], I'll do all 16 for $75, that's just under $5 each.

    "Ok, that should work, I think the others will go for that."

    == It's a fair price, yeah...

    "OK then, so I'll have 2 names at the end of month, and 2 more names at the end of May......... "

    AAAGGGHHHH!!!!!



    Simply put, your pricing is too cheap. under $5 for a 1x6 gold satin brass plate is too cheap. For laser work, that's fine. For engraved brass, it's way under.

    The issue is, everyone misquoted them. Trophy plate = "flexibrass" or sublimated aluminum (some people will also diamond drag aluminum with a 1 line letter).
    Equipment: IS400, IS6000, VLS 6.60, LS100, HP4550, Ricoh GX e3300n, Hotronix STX20
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    Business: Trophy, Awards and Engraving

  9. #24
    Quote Originally Posted by Scott Shepherd View Post
    About a month ago, on a Saturday, the phone rang. I didn't answer it because we were technically closed. Three of us were there working on a rush job. The last person in didn't lock the door. We heard the alarm chime go off, meaning someone came in. The other two people went up front to talk to them. They wanted 2 champagne glasses, a cake slicer, and a knife for a wedding. We priced it out and they left, saying they would bring the stuff in the following week.

    First, who calls, gets an answering machine, then gets in the car and drives there? (Not me!)

    The guy brings in the stuff and says "No hurry, the wedding isn't until May 2018". I typed that right. 2018.

    She starts calling 2 days later wanting to know when they can pick them up. She didn't give up. She wouldn't stop calling.

    Seriously? 13 months before your wedding and you HAVE to have these by Friday?

    Just out of curiosity, why not setup pickup dates when taking the order? On my little order sheet I have three dates. Date sold, date pickup, date of event. The first question I ask them is when is their event date. It immediately puts things into perspective for them. Then we work on an actual pickup date.
    Equipment: IS400, IS6000, VLS 6.60, LS100, HP4550, Ricoh GX e3300n, Hotronix STX20
    Software: Adobe Suite & Gravostyle 5
    Business: Trophy, Awards and Engraving

  10. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by Mike Lysov View Post
    Scott, you seem to be too kind for doing such orders.I would not if I had other orders to do.

    For all my 9 years being in this business and every time somebody came saying " I need it tomorrow, please help me" via email I was regretting trying to help them every single time at the end.


    I spent a significant amount of time replying to their emails, making proofs and pushing normal customers to the end of the queue and that's only to see these rush customers disappear. I cannot even recall a single time when such a rush customer actually placed their order. And that's happened to me 20-30 times over 9 years.
    Yes, I do try and help everyone, and I am quite grateful for our customers and their business. One of my faults is I try to help everyone, and some times you fail when trying to do that. I used to believe "You never know about that guy who's ordering 1 name tag, his wife or family member might have the keys to the Holy Grail of work". Yeah, I don't believe that any more


    Quote Originally Posted by Kev Williams View Post
    I can safely say that much of the reason I have the clientele I have, is because I've always done my best to get jobs finished on time, no matter the time frame.

    But there's a difference between helping someone out of a genuine crisis, and being taken advantage of. I do have my share of customers that used to bring work 1 to 2 weeks in advance, and after a rush job or two, now they're ALL rush jobs. To expound on what Steve says, I just love when after doing a gottahavitnow-waste-a-good-Saturday rush job, I get call 4 months later: "we're installing these plates and we just noticed"..... You're just NOW installing them??
    Couldn't agree more Kev. Make no mistake, this isn't a "my customers are horrible" thread, it's just an observation after 10 years of changes I'm seeing in the business. We deal with the changes accordingly, but in the process of figuring out how to deal with them properly (and profitably), it means we examine what's happening and make smarter decisions on what we accept and at what cost.


    Quote Originally Posted by Ross Moshinsky View Post
    Just out of curiosity, why not setup pickup dates when taking the order? On my little order sheet I have three dates. Date sold, date pickup, date of event. The first question I ask them is when is their event date. It immediately puts things into perspective for them. Then we work on an actual pickup date.
    They were told it would take 7-10 days once they approved the artwork, which would take a couple of days to get to them (it was sent the day after they dropped the items off).


    There is a local artist who found us and he called one day and asked if we could do some work for him. I told him we could, and he said "Great, what time do you close". I said "5:00". He said he'd be here by 5:00. He got here at 4:58, dropped off the project, then called at 7:45 the next morning and asked if we had gotten to it yet
    Last edited by Scott Shepherd; 05-01-2017 at 9:05 AM. Reason: fixed spelling error
    Lasers : Trotec Speedy 300 75W, Trotec Speedy 300 80W, Galvo Fiber Laser 20W
    Printers : Mimaki UJF-6042 UV Flatbed Printer , HP Designjet L26500 61" Wide Format Latex Printer, Summa S140-T 48" Vinyl Plotter
    Router : ShopBot 48" x 96" CNC Router Rotary Engravers : (2) Xenetech XOT 16 x 25 Rotary Engravers

    Real name Steve but that name was taken on the forum. Used Middle name. Call me Steve or Scott, doesn't matter.

  11. #26
    I'm not an engraver. But the worst customers are often wealthy deadbeats who seldom pay agreed price for anything. Our worst was a woman who had a large addition built on to an existing fine home. Even after not paying for stuff they kept trying to buy more stuff!! My boss was afraid of her! I finally called her husband and told him that if he did not get her under control I would have numerous crank calls made daily to his office and show up there and educate his clients. That worked. He was some type of financial adviser to people who needed it because they paid their bills.
    She demanded a painter inconveniently do some exterior painting on short notice because she was having a party. He complied and was told he would not be paid because "bugs were stuck on it". She affected a kind slightly ditzy persona
    in all negotiations. But was fierce and firm in telling all they would not get paid. I'm sure there are more demons out there.
    Last edited by Mel Fulks; 05-01-2017 at 12:12 PM. Reason: spelling

  12. #27
    Join Date
    Feb 2003
    Location
    Yorktown, VA
    Posts
    2,754
    At the civil engineering firm I retired from we would cost out a project as if it were going into our normal production schedule i.e wait it's turn in the line up. If the client needed something big ASAP we added a 25% 'quick turn surcharge' and informed the client of the extra cost involved in jumping the line. Some took their project elsewhere, some gladly paid the extra and some decided they were happy to wait in line. It worked for us.

  13. #28
    Join Date
    Feb 2003
    Location
    Hayes, Virginia
    Posts
    14,760
    After hours work and weekends should be billed at time and a half. Tell your customers that your current production work is one or more weeks out and their job will be done at the end of the current schedule. If they want to approve overtime for a rush job you will be glad to accommodate their schedule the best you can. Note that I would never go to work on a Saturday morning for a two hour job....it can wait until after 5 pm on Monday.

  14. #29
    Quote Originally Posted by Ross Moshinsky View Post
    Simply put, your pricing is too cheap. under $5 for a 1x6 gold satin brass plate is too cheap. For laser work, that's fine...
    I should've clarified, as I refer to everything as "engraving" ... this would be black-over-'brass' lasersteel, half the price of Rowmark and the job itself is 'full auto', as easy as it gets
    ========================================
    ELEVEN - rotary cutter tool machines
    FOUR - CO2 lasers
    THREE- make that FOUR now - fiber lasers
    ONE - vinyl cutter
    CASmate, Corel, Gravostyle


  15. #30
    Literally a couple days prior to this thread being posted and while it progressed through the weekend the following happened;

    Situation 1: Customer comes in Wednesday with small engraving job and wants it by Friday. I say, I can have it ready for you on Monday. Customer agrees and says Monday is good. I worked during the weekend to complete the job, emailed customer first thing Monday job was ready.... customer never showed.

    Situation 2: Customer emails he has "URGENT" need for stainless steel sign on Thursday afternoon. I email back with price and that I can have sign ready first thing Tuesday morning. I get email on Friday, that would be ok along with notification to another employee to get things rolling. Never heard from employee on Friday. Sent email on Monday morning requesting official go ahead or PO to have job ready Tuesday. Never heard from them, just crickets....

    Some things never change do they. Isn't life great!
    Red Bolt Laser Engraving
    Houston, Texas

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