A couple of weeks ago we ordered some modular furniture. Their initially pitch to me was with great enthusiam thinking we are a multi-national company who were intending to buy 100s of tables. As it slowly dawned on them this was not going to be a big order for them (we only wanted 3 tables) thier whole attitude suddenly changed.
Even tough we had been given a commitment as well as an inital advance, there seemed to some kind of reluctance of execution. We had to go after them for everthing, from the finalization of the proposal, the quotation and delivery dates...we felt we were being done a *favour* by them of selling us *just* 2-3 tables.
They finally actually even went to extent of telling us that our order was too small for them. They took own time to deliver the tables. We even rejected one of them due to poor quality and asked for a replacement. The replacement never came on the grounds that we were too finicky about the finish and they gave us back the money for the desk we had rejected.
So not only were we told that our job was *too small* for them but also that we were being outrageous for demanding quality equivalent to the price we were paying.
To me this is *biggest* mistake we in business make.... letting go of business or not give enough attention to business because we happen to be doing well & we dont need these small orders .
Business is Business and there is no question of big or small. If you are getting paid for the job as per your expectations and you have made a commitment to do it, there is NO excuse for not doing it nor giving it all the attention & quality required.
There might be an arguement there are times when orders and thier execution are not practical for your scale of operations but lest we forget it was us who got the order, it was us who quoted for it and it was us who knew the size of the order initially... if we knew it was too small then we should have never taken it in the first place.
Do not insult a prospective client with our definations of *big* & *small*. It is a task to be done which for the client is important and which they are ready to pay fairly for it so we have no right to reject the order as if it is thier fault it does not fit into your scale / present situation of operations.
Maybe at one point of time these orders were something we survived on and grew on and I am sure at that point of time they were consider life saving, path breaking orders so we should always keep this in mind. Our scale of operations and thier practical implications might have changed, not the nature of the task and not its value. It is bad business in the long run as I personally feel an attitude that says "oh this order is too small for me ...." is the beginning of the end of an enterprise.
You might say that it is a matter of symantices and how you word it but all of us know business is how you feel about things and about "gut feeling" and if you start feeling that you are above certain types of order not because it is impractical to do so but you are doing so well that you dont need smaller orders then you are asking for trouble....
