My
worth
Up until Google blessed (cursed?) me with free advertising a few years ago, we had virtually zero 'walk-in' customers, since 1969. Until Google, all of our customers were word-of-mouth offshoots from my dad's work buddies at Litton 50+ years ago. Many of these guys moved on from Litton; one went to work for Edo Western, one with Univac, one started a for-hospital computer business, couple of others started machine shops and injection molding shops-- and they all needed engraving of one sort or another, so they called my dad... And their work buddies and employees then knew where to get the engraving done, some of them moved on to other jobs, etc etc...
--aside from placing our name in the yellow pages, we have never advertised or solicited work. Our only 'street work' came from our customer's families and friends, who needed the occasional watch or baby spoon engraved...
Then a few years ago, we started getting cold calls, and that's when I found out we could be found on the internet via search engine!
For MOST people in this business, the possible increase in sales from free internet advertising would be a welcome windfall! But for me, it's been nothing but a headache. May sound a little crass, but it's true. My current non-solicited industrial oriented work load keeps me SO busy- 16-7 for a long time now- that dealing with cold-call/walk-in business is little more than a time-sucking distraction. Sounds a little crass but it's true...
As I type this, my BIL is working on a walk-in project I gave to him, a pair of wooden hearts a customer made & brought in, they each need a single name across one of the top arcs. Simple, right? He's pulling his hair out because the guys wife has, no less than 4 times, thrown out his design proofs; font isn't right; name isn't in the right place on the arc; it's on the wrong side of the heart; the heart (asymmetrical) is oriented wrong... He's already spent maybe 45 minutes of computer time on just orienting these 2 names, and still doesn't have a go-ahead...
THAT is walk-in work, and while not the norm, these kinds of customer interactions are fairly typical. If this type of work is your mainstay, you learn to deal with it, price accordingly, etc. But if you're used to work like mine, where customers already know exactly what they want you to do and supply you with the parts (usually) and computer-ready art/prints/diagrams/etc, you may find walk-in work riding the edge of 'not worth the trouble'...
Still, I rarely turn it down
(I'm just glad it's not MY mainstay!)