turning away business!!

[sellickbhoy]

done it for the 1st time tonight

I have a fruit and veg box business, but we supply a few other items from the local butcher, baker and deli

had a customer call tonight - recommended by a friend which is usually always nice. However, the friend isn't a good or regular customer and only orderded once (to take advantage of the initial 50% off offer on your 1st order)

anyway, this order was for everything BUT fruit and veg - and with the 50% off offer, i'd actually have made a loss on taking this order.

I asked the person if they would be ordering any fruit and veg - to which they replied they wouldn't as they didn't like it.

So I told them i was primarily a fruit and veg box business and that the other items were just wee add ons. As they didn't eat fruit and veg and as this order would just cost me money (and i didn't expect to see them again as a customer -though i never said that) I refused to take the order.

so, now i'm wondering if i did the right thing or is this just gonna create bad press

I wouldn't have minded if it was a small order, but it was about 3 times the price of my average order value

 

[RedEvo]

Perhaps re-think your offer - fruit and veg half price with first order?

d

 

[Vending Siting Services]

If you don't mind me asking, if you are a fruit and veg man, why are you offering 50% off other items which have nothing to do with fruit and veg?

Maybe you need to change your marketing and on fruit and veg orders over £x you will qualify for a 50% discount on other items, otherwise you are going to be running at a loss.

Barbara Fellowes

 

[MASSEY]

Considering it was 3 times the usual order i think you did well to turn it down

now you need to evaluate your offer and work out is it making you enough on average,

or will turning down the orders that are not profitabe hurt you pr wise or make you money in the longrun.

 

[sellickbhoy]

the problem is this.......when i started out, we had fruit and veg - simples, we've started adding items now

generally, we get orders for fruit and veg and maybe one or 2 other things.

the 50% off offer works fine in those cases - and doesn't make or lose me money

but this one order was for everything but fruit and veg - and given they said they wouldn't be ordering fruit and veg in the future, then i thought there wasn't much value in this as a customer.

to be honest, even at 50% off non fruit and veg items, it would only have lost me a about £5 but it was the fact the person had no intention of buying fruit and veg or using me in the future i decided to knock it back

also, i'm going to be changing the 50% off offer to 25% off in a couple of months as it was really a carrot to get customers to try us out and i was prepared to make loss on some initial orders.

But on this one, i just decided that the customer was at it (as was their friend who referred them as well, but i let that one go)

 

[Vending Siting Services]

The way I see it, you done the right thing. I would change your marketing though and maybe have the "carrot" for what brings in the money to encourage future repeat orders on fruit and veg if this is your main business.

Barbara Fellowes

 

[RBS]

OP,

IMO, you`ve done right. You showed them that you wont let them abuse your business and play games - self respect. Also, you showed you are not desperate for every order, your business is doing fine without them.

Just from another theme - how old are you, what van you got and how much insurance you pay for it per month?

 

[horsey1]

Hi

It will work if you advertise 50% off 1st order for fruit and veg only
maybe 20% off other goods but only with fruit and veg. I think you
would need a minimum spend.

Regards

Wayne ( Butcher )

 

[andav]

I asked the person if they would be ordering any fruit and veg - to which they replied they wouldn't as they didn't like it.

It still surprises me how many adults have similar tastes! I think you made the right call on not taking the order

 

[Successful Selling]

What has the issue of fruit and veg got to do with anything? If your customers want to buy something from you other than fruit and veg, as long as they are willing to pay the right price, go for it.

Your post tells me two things;
1. You have at least 2 customers who want to purchase something from you other than your core product.
2. You are only focusing you business on your core product.

I would therefore be wondering if more of your customers want non-fruit-and-veg products from you. You could be missing a trick.

May be you should reserching the possibility of pushing your non-fruit-and-veg products more?

After all, businesses only survive if they give the customers what they want at a price they are willing to pay.

I say re-price your non-fruit-and-veg products and start driving this forward.

 

[silvermusic]

Take it as a lesson learnt, that's the main thing and you've obviously learnt the hard way.

Whenever you do any sort of offer or promotion you need to sit down and think like a customer always keeping in mind there are those that will find any way round any offer to gain a rediculous bargain.

Make sure the offer is clear in it's scope and any limitations. In my book it's better to give a little off loads of multiple orders than it is to do large savings on trying to aquire new customers. In particular what you're selling is going to rely very much on repeat business. Your regulars will appreciate the odd offer or special deal much more than some chancer trying to get one over.

 

[povey_sindall]

Bad press or no bad press... Doing business and making a loss is generally not a good idea.

 

[Chris Ashdown]

How much bad publicity will you get from that upset customer, imagine he goes into the local pub and tells 5 people then tells his family say another 5, of which half tell another person and so on, for the sake of loosing £5.oo you have loads of unhappy potential customers

What you should have done by now is re do your offer as others have said to 50% off fruit and veg first order (note this discount does not include xx & xx products)

50% is a very large discount anyway, you should press the advantages of your products as the main selling point rather then price,

Local products,
Fresh from the farm
Supporting local farmers
Buy British
Organic etc

Then maybe our potatoes at 30% cheeper than Tesco (compared 6 April 2010) etc

 

[i234i]

It also could affect your other customer if this one comes back and says to them that they tried to order with you (after customer #1s recommendation!) and they couldnt.

 

[saxondale]

WTF`s a "discount"?