I went to look at some properties early today for our current project. Some were nice, others were better than nice. l spent the morning contacting Brokers and as of 3:00pm this afternoon only one had returned my call to say “we’re under contract on that parcel”. That was IT!
How about a bit of dialog?
Like, “I understand you are looking for property for the project you outlined to me, would another parcel nearby interest you?” How about a little bit of give a XXXX !!? We’re talking $MM$ here!! I was annoyed. I get SO annoyed with folks who live the “NO”.
Contrast this with the company doing some promotional materials for us. These folks call when they say they’re going to, accept custom designs and provide proofs at no charge. Then call back later to say they’ve just seen the strike-offs and they are “stunning”. “Of course there is no extra charge, we “quoted you” . They’re friendly and personable. All for a few hundred bucks of an initial order. Gotta love it, folks who are living in the “YES”.
Anyway, being a guy who never lets a good mad disperse easily, I fought the urge to “correct the situation with a simple phone call” and instead forced a bike ride to shake it off.
The cold front that brought the rain yesterday cooled things off and also brought a nice stiff breeze with it. The wind was against my face and chest the entire way south as I headed for Rice University. I pumped up quite a sweat even in the chill and my legs started burning earlier than usual as I worked to let the mad loose mile after mile. As I turned east I got a nice semi-side breeze at about 2:30 to my face. In sailing we’d call this a Close Reach.
It’s the best wind for a mono-hull to perform to its fullest design potential. Trim those sails and let her RIP....faster , faster !! The challenge with this point of sail is that the closer you haul to increase speed the closer you are to “The Irons”.
The Irons are the no man’s land of sailing.
It’s when your bow is faced dead into the wind. You can even try to go a few degrees port/starboard but you are still “in irons”, you're going nowhere !! Sometimes working HARD just works against you because the tide, waves or other elements are “not in your favor”.
It’s an unhappy place.
So, I continued east and stopped for a bit at the ½ price book store to see what they had (nothing). Then I peddled around the various shops and watched the people, still trying to shake off my mad from earlier. It occurred to me as I was riding that I had put myself in IRONS.
ME, not the Broker.
This morning, I had been cruising along slowly developing the options for the property for this project and then began running Close Hauled with high hopes and expectations for the new parcel I had discovered. Faster, Faster !! I already had a movie going about the next steps needed to complete the project. I was in LaLa land. When I received his call I was actually just disappointed. I turned it into a mad to mask the HUGE Bummer I was feeling.
YES and NO all in one.
I circled the shops a few more times and headed back home to start looking for more listings again. It was smooth sailing all the way.
Great post. Non Attachment as the buddhists would say, is the key...and yes, we seem to have lost the concept of customer service. I had a similar experience over a piece of property a few years ago. What the? Aren't you in the business to sell something?? However, there are good people out there who do understand service...as you pointed out in your graphic production efforts...
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