Last Friday I was excited because a customer of mine called me up
to tell me that his order had arrived. This customer is the son of
another customer of mine. Over the past couple of weeks we've been on
the phone back and forth. During our conversation he called my services
exceptional and thanked me several times for guiding him through his
initial inventory order.
Monday afternoon I was almost out the door when my phone rang. I let
it ring a couple of times. My boss told me to let voicemail take it but
another coworker of mine said it might be something important. It was
the customer I had sent shoes to on Friday. When we discussed his order
he said he wanted all of the shoes to be a medium width. It was a detail
we worked through because his father's O&P practice is going to be
sending patients there and most of those people need a wider width shoe
so he wanted his son to call me and arrange for me to send call tags
back
As soon as I hung up with him I called my boss. My plan was to work
out a deal where they had extended terms to pay. Freight on 200 shoes is
about $500 depending on where you send them and I was not looking
forward to telling my boss that I had just cost our company half a
grand. Monday evening I left work wondering what Tuesday was going to
bring.
Tuesday morning my first call was a customer of mine who needed
something right away. After dealing with that I called my customer who
wanted to send the shoes back. We talked for about half an hour and I
guess you could say I was pretty keyed when I hung up the phone because
now instead of returning the medium shoes and duplicating the order in
wides the customer wanted to keep the medium width shoes and double his
order. So in half an hour I turned a situation that was going to cost us
money into a very profitable order.
At lunch I was telling my girlfriends about my adventures, we were
discussing the possibility that at some future point I was going to have
to absorb freight costs on shoes back to us anyways and I said that
could happen but if I knew that kid at all he was going to work twice as
hard as he normally would just so he could tell his father 'I told you
so'. My job is to sell when appropriate and figure ways to talk people
out of what I'm not sure they can sell. I know this kid fairly well,
he's aggressive and solution oriented. He accepts ideas and advice but
is also not afraid to stick up for his ideas which I believe will serve
him well in the future.
While we were discussing this order my friend said she didn't know
what to do with a customer who wanted to return a big order he had
placed back in November. We talked about it for a while, I went back to
work, got caught up in a pharmacy who wanted to return their entire
display, that would have cost us about $600, but instead I worked out a
deal with an account of mine in another town who was willing to pick up
the display as long as their was no charge for it.
That night I was driving home thinking about the guy down in Texas
who was sitting on thousands of dollars of inventory. On a whim I picked
up my phone and called a good customer of mine who stocks shoes. I gave
him a brief outline of the situation and asked if he would be
interested in buying inventory from another customer. After giving him
what details I had he said he would talk to his boss and get back to me.
That night I had to pick the girls up from soccer practice. We were
late getting home and I was not expecting a voicemail from my customer
saying that his boss was prepared to drive three hours to look at the
inventory that I had told him about.
All of a sudden I had a situation on my hands. First, would the
customer be interested in selling inventory he couldn't move? Secondly
what was my role and the role of my company in a stock shoe transfer, my
boss asked if my customer was expecting a discount, if he was what
would be appropriate and how much could we trust either of the people
involved in this given a transaction that was hundreds of miles away and
how would we track something like this because if we were going to take
a freight hit we wanted that to come from the account that had
initially purchased the shoes.
If you want to know how that turned out you'll have to wait until I
go back to work on Monday because I had the day off on Friday. Growing
up there were three families that hung out quite a bit. Friday morning I
went to the funeral of a thirty year old who played Micromachines with
my brother. The last funeral I attended before this one was in January.
The letter written by the man who had died was absolutely beautiful
especially given the fact that he was in an incredible amount of pain.
At Friday's funeral Josh had spoken words he wanted read aloud to
everyone. Josh had fractured his skull in several places after falling
unexpectedly, he had been having seizure like episodes recently, however
he died after a clot in his leg broke loose. I'm glad his parents were
there to say goodbye regardless of how hard that must have been. A
customer of mine is going to participate in competitive bidding. If
you're unfamiliar with that process you submit bids for goods or
services and the government chooses who they are going to accept as a
vendor.
When I explained why I wouldn't be in on Friday my customer said he
was sorry to hear about the loss. At the funeral I had a chance to talk
to the wife of a guy I used to date. I'm sure she must know I used to go
out with her husband and things between us would be awkward anyways
since her brother-in-law is my niece's father but we wound up in the
entryway together and I'm happy to report that we had a wonderful
conversation about the past, the three families that used to hang out
together and how that was the type of thing she wanted for her daughter
who is my niece's cousin.
Before I found out that Josh was no longer with us on this earth I
had a chance to talk to a friend of mine who always has interesting
things to say. Our conversation ended with him stating that people
tended to lose sight of what was important in life. That comment was in
response to me worrying about who knows what which goes to show you that
it must not have been all that important if I can't remember it now. At
the funeral I talked to Josh's grandmother who wished she could have
gone instead of him.
Because we were close I knew most of Josh's extended family. His
cousin was crying in the bathroom, there were no dry eyes that I saw and
it was strange to see men and boys I knew growing up wiping their eyes
and telling other people that they loved them. For me the funeral was a
very profound experience in many ways. My children stayed at my sister's
place with my niece and part of me regrets not bringing them to meet
people who knew me as a little girl.
This is shaming to admit but for a while I vacillated about going to
the funeral. I hate getting dressed up, crying in public is embarrassing
and although I knew his family well I was much older than Josh and
wouldn't have called him a close friend of mine. What changed my mind
was me sitting at my desk thinking, if our roles were reversed I know
Josh would be at my funeral. Neither of my parents went which I also
feel is shameful. My father wasn't feeling well which could possibly be
excused. In my mind my mother has no excuse although if you talk to her
I'm sure you'll hear that this is a busy time at work and she just got
back from vacation.
I had to take off to go to the funeral. When my family knew Josh we
lived in Green County, hailed as The Swiss Cheese Capital of the World,
agricultural influences are heavy throughout that area. A neighbor of ours was a
cheesemaker growing up and it was cool to see pictures of Josh working
with monstrous wheels of different cheeses. People down there tend to be
unpretentious. Josh's dad wore a shirt that was printed with muscle
cars. When he saw me he gave me a huge hug and just like old times my
family was one of the last to leave after the funeral was over and
everything had been cleaned up.
To say the funeral was fun or a good time would be pushing it. Josh
was musically gifted and the hymns he chose were heartbreaking. On his
bucket list was 'helicopter ride'. Days before he died he flew in a
helicopter although I'm sure that trip was not what he was thinking when
he wrote that. People can say what they want about being religious but I
have to say that the funerals of people who believed leave me feeling
much better than the ones where religion is left out in favor of 'let's
say nice things about dead people' agenda.
I felt very small for not wanting to go. I'm glad I took off and made
an effort to get dressed up out of respect for Josh and his family who
couldn't have cared less what I wore. My family sent a plant instead of
flowers. My sister handled the arrangement and I thougth the peace lily
was an appropriate choice because Josh worked hard at maintaining good
relations with others. One woman whose name I'm sure I should remember
said no one could say anything against Josh. He was a credit to his
parents, his school and his job as a supervisor where he worked.