No Deal

If you thought I was going to talk about the American Freedom Caucus, you're wrong.  Instead, I'd like to touch on a certain customer base.  We have a lot of Indians, and Asians, and Middle Eastern, and a lot of Slovakian groups in Central Pa.  It is not unusual to see women in Burkas wandering our aisles.  For these people haggling is a part of the buying process; a high price is negotiated down to one that is acceptable.  We don't work that way.   We advertise our lowest prices to get people into the store, we entice them into buying with discounted prices.  With the customer base, however, usually the first question they ask is "what discounts are you offering today?"  Right now we are having a deal on free installation on carpet, so I point that out, and their response is always.  "No, what deals do you have on carpet?"  We don't do discounts on carpets.  They don't understand this.
Sometimes they find this frustrating.  Coming from cultures in which prices are always elevated, in which the individual buyer works to get the best deal possible our low prices short circuit their logic.  I had a customer last evening who just couldn't understand.  He kept repeating "there must be a lower price."  He said that a local, Mom & Pop carpet store had given him a total measurement 100 square feet less.  I pulled out the floor plans we created and said "we use lasers, we are very precise," and showed him his square footage.  He then said, "they are smaller, you are bigger, you should give a better discount," to which I said, "we will price match if you bring us a quote for the same type carpet."  He mulled this over for about 2 minutes, and then said "no deal," got up and walked away.

Some of my fellow associates find this frustrating.  I don't.  This is how it is.  I know some who have caved in order to get the sale, which sets a bad precedent.  We have a customer right now who's managed to get markdown after markdown and, in the end, we will lose money because one person said "okay."  I have had people threaten to take their business to our competitor and I've smiled and said, "go ahead;" rather they take the hit than us.

Either we will change or they will.  Somehow I don't think we will start adjusting our sale's plan to account for haggling, so I suspect, in the end, they will have to stop saying "no deal."