My husband and I own an inflatable company. We rent out bounce houses and waterslides for private parties, church and school events, family reunions, etc. We love the industry we are in – people are always happy to see you! – and we love making people happy.
This is our 4th season in this business and there has definitely been a learning curve involved. My personality is that I’m a natural pleaser and want to leave everyone as happy as possible. However, I learned early on that a polite spine and boundaries are necessary in this business if you want to stay afloat.
The first two seasons in business we CONSTANTLY had people calling us from organizations, charities and large corporations asking for us to “sponsor” a bounce house at their event. We did this a few times, with the promise of “free advertising” as an incentive. We learned very quickly that this type of advertising is completely ineffective in our industry and we never booked a single job from doing these free events. We made a decision that we would pick our favorite charity and donate a bounce house to their annual event and that would be the end of our give- free-stuff-away-extravaganza. We’ve been happy with this arrangement for some time now. However, we still get phone calls – though not as frequent. I’ve learned how to have a polite spine, but even beyond that, I’ve learned how to expose their greediness in a fairly kind way. The conversation below is one that I had this week with a HUGE national company that was holding a health fair.
Me: How can I help you?
Freeloader: Hi, I’m with ______ and we are holding our annual event in a few months. We wanted to give you a great opportunity to sponsor our event with some bounce houses.
Me: : (pretending to feign interest) We love renting out for big events! Could you further explain what you mean by “sponsor”? What all does that entail? (I know good and well it means they want a free bounce house, but I want THEM to say it, instead of pretty it up with a word like sponsor.)
Freeloader: Oh….ummm….well, errrr…..It means that you would donate a bounce house to the event.
Me: OH. Donate a bounce house to you?? (silence)
Freeloader: But, it, ummmm, it means that you would get free advertising. It would be a great opportunity for you!
Me: We have found that this type of advertising does not work for us. (awkward silence)
Freeloader: Oh, well it would still be a nice thing for you to do.
Me: – (names company) Isn’t that a multi-million dollar company?
Freeloader: Ummm, yes.
Me: I’ve seen their commercials, gone into their stores. You guys have great products.
Freeloader: Yes we do.
Me: So, just to clarify, you are wanting me, a very small family-owned business, to donate my labor, fuel, time and bounce house to YOU, a multi-million dollar company?
Freeloader: (silence)
Me: Would you be willing to give us the equivalent of free products in return?
Freeloader: Well, ummm, no I don’t think we could do that.
Me: I see. (silence. I let the silence get reeeeeally awkward)
Me: I’ll be happy to give you some prices on what we offer. We do offer a discount for multiple rentals and multiple days. (I then go into my spiel about what products we have.)Sometimes I end up booking them but in this case they said they would keep calling around to find a company that would “sponsor” their event.
It’s unbelievable to me the nerve and gall that people have. This has happened with corporations, charities, churches and even private parties. It takes a crew that WE pay for labor to deliver and set up, it takes fuel in OUR diesel truck and trailer to get the bounce house to the location, it take state inspections that we pay for to make sure they are safe and it takes expensive insurance that we pay for to cover any liability. Maybe people don’t realize the cost of running a small business. Often we wonder how we will pay for insurance and overhead costs. Small businesses go under every single day. The next time you think to ask your friend, family member or random small business to give you something for free – whether it’s a haircut, a music lesson, a vehicle check-up or whatever – please remember that their livelihood depends on your business. Supporting local, small businesses doesn’t mean ask them to do stuff for free and receive “free advertising”. It means write them a check for a product or service the same way that YOU want to receive a paycheck for your time and labor. 0705-18
Tag: Customers
Camping Out Restaurant Style
I’m hoping to preempt the rude customers by sending this to you before they do. I will also preface this by saying I am currently on a break between classes, am very sleep deprived, and therefore very grouchy, so I apologize for my writing demeanor.
I am a server in a somewhat fancy restaurant. Last night I had quite possibly the rudest customers in the world. About 6:30 they came in and were seated in my section. I introduced myself, offered them wine and took their drink orders. The meal largely went without a hitch (one meal had to be remade because there were special instructions and it got messed up), and I served them, brought them their check, and proceeded to start bussing the remaining tables. Then I started bussing their plates. They were still at the table. I quietly removed everything except the glasses, salt and pepper. They were still at the table.
I finished my side work (for the uninitiated, restaurant workers have “side work” that they do to ensure the restaurant is ready for opening the next day). They were still at the table. I rolled the rest of the silverware. They were still at the table. I cleaned the rest of the tables in my section. They were still at the table. Five hours had passed. They were still at the table. The restaurant had closed. They were still at the freakin’ table!
If they’d “camped out” for only a couple of hours, it wouldn’t have been such a big deal. Camping happens. It’s a pain and you can’t make money off that table, but it happens. This was camping to an extreme. The rest of the waitstaff had gone home. The kitchen staff had gone home. It was just the manager and me left. The manager finally asked them to leave.
I have never seen such a temper tantrum from a group of adults before in my entire life. They ranted and raved about how rude we were for not serving them. About how awful we were for making them leave. They were apparently paying us for the table so we needed to allow them to stay as long as they wanted. It took a threat of a police phone call and potential prosecution for trespassing to get them to leave. They threatened to tell you here at ehell all about how terribly rude I was (I am hoping that in the cold light of sobriety and morning they are mortified for their actions and aren’t going to do it).
They didn’t leave a tip. I didn’t get home until after midnight, and still had to stay up for a couple of hours for homework. 1023-14
Nothing yet from the customers to the Ehell in-box.
The Department Store Is Their Ashtray
On the Saturday before Mother’s Day I went to a large, sort of upscale department store to shop for some spring clothes. It was crowded and after picking out a couple of things to try on I waited for a dressing room. When I finally got one, was shocked to find six pairs of jeans on the floor in a heap. I thought I would at least pick them up and lay them across the back of a chair and noticed that at least three pairs were inside out (they were skinny jeans and probably difficult to take off). I wound up putting the jeans right side out and hanging them back up on the hangers. I felt bad for whoever would have had to do this job on such a busy day and also was kind of worried that whoever came into the room after me would think I had left such a mess. Later, in the shoe department, I was waiting for the clerk to bring some shoes for me to try on and as I sat I noticed the floor completely littered with tissue from the boxes, cardboard inserts from the shoes, those little footie-things people put on, etc. The staff was being run ragged because the store was so crowded; it was not like anyone could come around immediately and pick these things up. But then, shouldn’t these would-be customers be respectful enough of not only the staff but of new retail merchandise–who wants to buy something someone else has thrown on the floor in a heap? What is wrong with people these days? Is it so hard to at least make an attempt to put things back as you found them? 0513-14
I’m with you. I pick up my stuff and replace it on the hangers or fold it….maybe not as neatly folded as the store staff would do but I make the effort.
We have a saying in our family when we see things like this, “The world is their ashtray.” Only in your case, the department store is some people’s ashtray. They just wander through life depositing the detritus of their existence expecting everyone else to clean up in their wake. It’s an imperial form of entitlement as if they were too highly positioned in life to ever deign to stoop to such menial tasks. The concept of leaving the world a little better than you found it is utterly lost on them.
Checked Out At The Check Out
After moving in March to a new neighborhood, I found one of the local chain pharmacies to be a convenient one-shop-stop for everything from milk to the chocolate fix to light bulbs. I had been frequenting there at least weekly, usually more, for several months at the time of this incident. (Important to the story: I “green bag” at every opportunity to avoid the waste and pileup of plastic bags.) The clerks soon began to recognize me when I came in, and we always exchanged pleasantries and had brief chats while checking out. The store manager was a different story. He always had a scowl on his face, never clean-shaven, generally unkempt, and he never greeted me. That was not a huge deal. The clerks were friendly enough, and I rarely had to deal with him.
I went in one late afternoon a couple months ago and picked up a few items, and as I was having a couple friends over for dinner that night, I browsed the wine aisle for something to go with dinner. (No comments, please–they have a few mid-grade wines that are acceptable for a decent dinner.) I selected a bottle and went to the front of the store to check out. They were busy, so I was standing in line behind a couple of people, and the store manager appeared suddenly and asked, “Can I check your bag?” I responded, a bit confused, “Excuse me?” He pointed to the green bag I was carrying, and said, “I need to check that.” I was so startled, I simply said, “Sure,” and set the bag on the floor and pulled a handle to one side so that he could see the contents — q’uelle horreur! — my purse! (I don’t carry large purses–just enough for wallet, keys and lipstick) He said, “Okay,” then walked around to the counter to expedite the growing line, which now had several customers. Of course, I was mortified, and another woman and I just exchanged horrified looks.
He ended up ringing up my purchases, and I asked him if I had done something wrong. He replied, “I thought I saw you take a box of wine.” A BOX OF WINE? Those are HUGE! Obviously, I presented my green bag again for bagging the items I BOUGHT.
I stewed for a couple days and did an online complaint to the company. I conceded voluntarily that I probably should have removed the purse and flattened the bag to remove suspicion, but I was also not aware I looked so suspicious. I did say that I thought the manager could have made sure he was the one who checked me out, and in the bagging process, he would have clearly seen that no ill-gotten wine boxes were stowed in my bag.
The company representative who contacted me was apologetic and courteous and told me that a $10 gift card would be waiting at the store for me. About a week later, I stopped in and mentioned the card, and the same manager brought it to apply to my purchases. He looked down at the post-it note on the card, and read it aloud, choppily, like someone who was still learning to read (granted, the handwriting could have been bad)–“I’m…supposed…to…apologize…to…you…” His head jerked up, scowled at me, and asked, “Apologize? Apologize for what?”
I held up my hand and said, “Never mind.” It just didn’t seem worth a confrontation. I have only been in the store once since.
And I now always fold/flatten my green bags. 0911-13
Powerless Pizza
A little background to my story. I live in the state capital, over 1,000,000 people live in the “metropolitan area.” I work at a restaurant that serves a ton of different food, but also brew their own beer, but is best known for our pizza. We are not a bar and we are not a “pizza place.” We are an upscale casual restaurant. We have two locations in the “metropolitan area,” one on each side of the county. On Friday, our state endured severe thunderstorms. The wind and lightning causes trees to fall over, things to catch on fire, and knocked out power to almost 1/3 of the state (this is important). Our governor has even declared a state of emergency.
Back to my work, our location across the county lost power. To keep their food from spoiling, they brought it all over to our location. We then find out that our restaurant is one of the only places IN THE ENTIRE COUNTY that still has power. (We think this may be because the building was literally built less than a year ago and everything is brand new). But alas, all this extra food did not help. We were slammed. Since barely anyone had power, and we were one of the only places open, we had a much, much higher than usual crowd of people. We actually started running out of certain foods. Pizza, being the main thing. This is not to say we didn’t have anything to serve. Our menu is 16 pages long. The thing is a book. There is literally something for everyone.
Cue to the take-out line. I was just informed, literally 10 seconds before, that we were out of pizza when, we’ll call her “Jane”, calls wanting, you guessed it, PIZZA. I politely inform her that, I am sorry, but we are currently out of pizza, but can we prepare anything else for her. She gets angry and demands to know, “How in the hell we could possibly run out of pizza! You advertise that everything is hand-made and fresh so how are you out of something?” I tell her politely that yes, we do in fact make our food in house and fresh, but we had run out of ingredients to make more pizza crusts. She FLIPS. How dare we run out of pizza! Don’t we know that she doesn’t have power and she can’t make food? How dare we starve her children! And, “Let me speak to your manager.” Umm what? My manager can’t magically make you a pizza that we have no ingredients for! Despite that pesky little fact, I do get my manager for her, where he proceeds to tell her the exact same thing I just did, albeit a little ruder because he was just pulled out of the kitchen where orders are taking 30-45 minutes because there are just so many of them (we usually take 15-20 minutes). After he speaks with her and informs her we can make her something else on the menu, he hands the phone back to me. The woman AGAIN yells at me for having the audacity not to have pizza! After she’d spoken to my manager! As the phone was ringing off the hook, I asked her if she planned to get anything else. She again grumbled about her kids wanting pizza. So I interrupted her rant and said, “I’m sorry ma’am, but since it doesn’t seem like you will be ordering a meal from our restaurant, I have other customers to serve. Have a good day.” And hung up! 0704-12
For one small moment in time, you thwarted the entitlement training of several junior gimme pigs.
Natural disasters have a way of bringing the entitled people out into the open. We came through Hurricane Fran years ago with no power for 10 days and for the most part neighbors and friends worked together to clean debris and help with food. Half the neighborhood got their power back before we did so we emptied the freezer of meat and gave it away which came back to us in the form of hot meals and dinners invitations. I remember practically kissing the National Guardsmen who manned the local high school so residents could take showers. The only ugliness I encountered was a band of angry homeowners in another subdivision who literally took to the streets to protest that their neighborhood still did not have power. Those of us in cars were backing out of there to avoid the drama which was, for some odd reason, directed at cars and not at the electrical work crews. Ummm, I don’t have any power either…why are you threatening me who can do nothing about it?