Today at our showroom our shop guy accidently sold a customers board, wouldnt be a huge deal except the customer whose board it was is leaving Tuesday morning.
Shop Manager called the guy who took the wrong board apologized, Explained the situation and offered to rush him a custom at a discount and drive all the way up to him to get the board.
I called and texted the guy 4-5 times with different offers… No response even offered 100.00 off
Customer called and pleaded with the guy that he was going on a trip he has saved for for a year and that was his main board.
Its a shitty situation and its totally faulted on our side just trying to get any ideas on anything I missed.
Free board from anything in stock to the guy who’se board you sold. If you don’t have what he needs any board he wants from a nearby shop. You pick up the tab. Do the right thing and it will pay you back in the long run.
I also find it funny how on your facebook page you completely leave out the part about the employee selling the board and leave the impression that the guy, to use your exact words from the two wall posts on the matter “accidently walked out with another customer’s board”. He didn’t accidently walk out with…you accidently sold it. Big difference in the english language. It’s up to you to make it right for all parties involved and to be honest attempting to make the other guy look like the bad guy is not good business.
This facebook post on the matter blows me away: “Sometimes its hard to have faith in people, You walk out with another customers board, who is leaving on a trip Tuesday Morning and The shop, the owner and the customer call you to apologize explain what happened and reach out to you for help… And you tell everyone pretty much to fuck off… Your a sad case man, way to ruin that guys trip and basically screw a bunch of people over. Its a bummer that some people cant just man up and do the right thing.”
In the facebook replies that followed you had plenty of oportunities to square up with the facts and you didn’t. You leave people with a dishonest impression of what happened and let people call this guy names.
To me it sounds like its you who’se trying to avoid doing the right thing and trying to make the other guy look bad on a public forum while leaving out important details about how you screwed up is a total bullshit way to approach this.
I can’t help but wonder what other details you are leaving out or how you will spin things moving forward. Honesty really is the best policy.
Click the link below. I should have expanded the comments to show more of where names are being hurled at the buyer…and the shop owner does nothing to correct the record. Bottom line the buyer didn’t accidently do anything. You and your staff did. The buyer didn’t scew up anyone’s trip, you and your staff did. Man up and make it right for all parties involved even if it costs you a few hundred bucks. Big deal. In the end you will be better off. As it stands now you’ve screwed up with two customers. No fault of your own but that is the perception of both people even if they put a happy face on things.
How did someones board get a price tag attached to it, or how was a deal brokered to sell it? I know, it just did.
So it’s not the customers fault. The customer wanted to buy the board…and he did. No harm, no foul. I always ask myself this question when buying a car, surfboard, anything that looses 1/2 it value the nimute you touch it. Stay with me here:
If you buy a car and find out you paid too much for it, you go back to the dealership and ask for the difference in price. Q: What does the dealership do? A; tells the customer tell you to get lost.
If you buy a car and you found out you didn’t pay enough for the car…The dealership call you and says, “Hey get down here, you didn’t pay enough for this car”. Q What does the customer do? A: Tells the dealership to get lost.
So customer had his board sold out from under him to a opportunistic shopper. It’s not the used board purchaser problem to make things right, he bought it fair and square. The gains or losses of a business falls squarely on the shoulders of the owner or manager.
We can not make an assessment that a customer is going to make the right decision. Customers pay too much for boards all the time (I bet you have sold plenty of over priced boards, Or I should say a great margin), and in this case, the customer didn’t pay enough (Im assuming, or else you wouldn’t be trying to get it back).
So in my humble opinion, you need to get a new board to the guy who had his favorite board sold out from under him fast, before he takes you to small claims court. Hopefully you got $150-$250 for the used board, so you are only going to be out another $150-$250.
Also, make the numb nutz that sold the board wash your car weekly for the next years. That would be $10.00 hr wash x 52 wks = $520
Especially, if the buyer was hammered by the shop owner as Mako states(who I regard as a straight shooter) on the internet. What’s up with that? YOU need to square that up with the custom buyer. mike
Don't understand why you're asking . With your vast experience you should know what to do. Welcome to the industry and fire your "shop" guy. Ask tourself ; " What would they do over at Als??
thanks for letting us all know what a douche you are… typical spoiled Newport punk. why keep ruining yourself when the solution is so simple? not to 'Evolved"
shops that put customer’s boards in the rack to make it look like they have inventory sucks.
My first custom order from a shop in Manhatten beach went like this,
ordered board and was told to expect 6 to 8 weeks, and was stoked,
after 8 weeks I gave them a call to check in, no board, no sweat , still stoked.
10 weeks , called again, yeah we got your board last week, gave them payment and shipping info.
two weeks go by, no board, not stoked anymore, another week and finally had to call a courier to go to the store and pick up my board,and call the manager of the store to let him know he had 24 hrs
to get my board boxed.
If only I had picked up on the warning signs, I had been in that shop on a layover to Tahiti, saw a few
boards in the rack that I was interested in, all had prices on them but none of them were for sale,
" they were spoken for"
We have a pick up rack and our sales racks seperately. For some reason the the OG customer didnt want his name on the board just dims, so it just looked like shop stock.
Just confusion as it was just a clear board and we have several of that style in stock.
Just an unfortunant accident that we need to look at and put a system in place to ensure it doesnt happen again.
Sometimes you find bugs where you dont think there are bugs.
The customer
who ordered it should get his next board free and the lad that Purchased the
board and then was asked to give it back should get a free new board.
The sales
man should become there personal assistant for twelve months.
Do you really think giving away free boards to all the parties offended is the best business practice? Probably not, but making some form of restitution would be approporiate. Maybe a smoking deal towards there next board, maybe a couple of fin sets? You want to keep the customers coming back, but also not seen as someone you can take advantage of. Build the client base by being fair and honest.
Always keep it above board and the customer is always right… But don’t give away the farm, or they will take advantage of you.
