Business Blogs (303)

Hours before the Foo Fighters band were set to perform at Festival Estéreo in Bogota, Columbia, 50 year old Drummer Taylor Hawkins was found dead in his hotel room. Toxicology report shows he had several prescription and illegal drugs in his body.
As a result of the death of their drummer, Foo Fighters have announced they are cancelling all of their remaining tour dates.

What's to become of the band?
My prediction is they will return to the United States, go into hiding for a few months and quietly audition a replacement drummer to get back on the road and possibly return to South America to honor those cancelled tour dates. Although Taylor was an integral part of the band, it's not like Led Zeppelin where the death of John Bonham ended the Zeppelin experience.
Dave Grohl, drummer, guitarist, front man and founder of Foo Fighters has seen death before. He was the drummer for Nirvina that disbanded when Kurt Cobain ended his life from suicide by gunshot.

Admit it, Taylor was a drug addict. Dave almost lost him from an earlier incident and there were no stopgaps in place. He killed the musical careers of the other band members.
Should they disband, Grohl, will survive. I cannot say what would happen to the others without Dave. Would they fade away into obscurity without Dave?

That would be a bad case of no Foo without you...

In the business world, if you want to know what the competition is doing, you can resort to some low level espionage by sending a person to go around to your competitors pretending to be a real customer.
They can check out their office, showroom, factory and see how their sales staff operate, get prices and find out what negotiations they are able to make to get the best price.

The person elected to do the job could be family or a friend, most importantly that person must be savvy to the business and know the differences what the competition is pricing.

That person is called a Mole.

A place I worked at a few years ago had lots of local competition and the boss was lucky enough to have communication with one person he lost a sale to. That helped him refine his sales pitch by educating prospective clients BEFORE they went shopping elsewhere and to be suspicious of 'low ball' bids. Some companies call that 'comparing apples to apples' in that, price means little if the lower bid isn't equal to the other bids.

The lost sale customer went back to tell my boss he was sorry for making a bad decision. He signed with the other company mostly on price and confidence it was their best deal. After paying a deposit and seeing the drawings, many of the items were left out. Adding all what my boss included, the other company considered them as upgrades, brought the price higher than the bid my boss gave.

I had a situation with a possible client last week. He recently bought a home near the Intracoastal Waterway, complete with a dock and it wouldn't surprise me if he's investing $300,000 in the renovation. He and his wife came to my showroom to see samples and discuss their wants. They loved the tour of the factory. Although, they knew what they wanted, they had been to see 2 other local suppliers and had prices. One had a shop but (for some reason) wasn't happy with them. The other had a retail showroom, but no factory. Since that company is in an upscale neighborhood, I expected their price to be around the same as mine.

The client did mention good quality at a good price. I represented the sale would be what he was asking for.

Expecting to be able to submit prices on Monday, I found time to meet with my estimator and was able to submit a proposal Friday.
The guy replied on Saturday to tell me I was the highest bid and he was going with another company. I asked how much and he said $38,000 to my $44,500.
Repeating our track record and quality would be a waste of time. Price was the attachment for him.

Thanking him for the comeback. Yes, it was a loss, but I consider it a reverse mole where he told me something important about another vendor.
We recently changed our logo and added 'Luxury Cabinetry' to it.
Hopefully, it will make a difference with my cost conscience clients.

It seems like the whole world is on backorder. I was notified by the car dealer where I purchased a car 2 years ago to come see the new arrivals. I asked specifically about test driving a new model this year... Unfortunately, they haven't arrived yet and they told me "Those are on backorder and on a first come, first available basis."
"If I want to be on a list, come in and place a deposit."

I went to Guitar Center the other day looking for a left-handed bass guitar. Probably 125 bass guitars and 300 guitars in stock... not one of them were left-handed.
The salesman checked other stores and inquired on the manufacturer's website and can only estimate 4 to 6 months wait.

A group of us are waiting for model helicopter parts. Plastic and metal parts come in little-by-little but fiberglass canopies have been out of stock for months with no date when they will be available.

Back to cars... Since the demand is so great for a few models, dealers are now charging much more than sticker price. It's almost like real estate bidding wars. If you snooze, you lose.

This is a global concern and I'm glad my needs are small. I'm wondering what happens in the medical field where someone is waiting for a knee replacement surgery and kneecaps are on backorder...

Some of you may remember when Trump overstayed his residency at Mar-a-Lago and was forced to seek housing elsewhere.
Realtors were quick to get him a place next to Mar-a-Lago.
He's moved around since then and recently that house went up for sale.
It's listed at $59 million, which is $10 million more than the listing a year ago.
Quite a price jump.

Location, location, location...

I've always been a procrastinator. World class at that. I remember having school assignments with specific due dates and the night before, I would stay up late, often crashing but setting the clock for 4am and finishing the assignment with only a few minutes to shower and get to school. It amazed me (and my family) when I would get a really good grade for the work turned in.

Yesterday, was 2-22-2022 and I had a busy day planned. I read in a few places that it would be a good day for many.
Eye exam at 10:00 as one in the late afternoon (after 6 hours of computer work) failed.
My eyes couldn't focus then, but the exam in the morning was successful.
11:30 I met with a contractor to recheck a microwave/steam oven dimension that was in storage for a kitchen remodel I released to production.
Driving 30 miles for a 1:30 appointment, the client already tore out walls, kitchen and flooring. He was literally ready for cabinets. When I asked why he didn't call sooner, his response was the guy before me only gave him a 'chicken scratch' drawing of what he planned for the new layout. He's obviously not getting the job.
2:30 another appointment on the way back to the office to measure a wall unit. The client liked my suggestions along with photos of previous projects I completed.
4:00 meeting on the east side of Boca Raton and I walked in to a 7 million dollar home where a designer painted a dark wood kitchen all white. The client threw him off the job as he didn't sand and prep the old cabinet doors, failed to use a primer and instead of removing each door, he spray painted them in place! You could run a fingernail over the door and the paint will chip off! The client decided to have the entire kitchen replaced so we went over a new layout that I'll present to them in showroom.
6:00 back to the office to make notes for the appointments (while the details are still in my head) and head home at 7:30.

8:00 and my phone is nagging me Google has some new features that old phone didn't know about. Sheesh...

2-23-2022, enjoy your day.

Last week, I received a call from a woman who is renovating her winter home in Florida. She claims to have lost communication with another design company and wants to find someone else. I told her the time-frame we can build by and it appeared to be acceptable.

For the layout and specific details, she had her husband send over drawings and an appliance list. We passed a few emails and I quoted a price. I also redid the layout as the one supplied wasn't to my liking. More questions and I had answers for every pass of mail.

Most of the questions were to lower the price... that can only be done by omitting something in the design or changing to a less expensive material. I again responded with options.

There is a $4,000 difference in my adjusted price and want they are willing to pay. The husband also included a statement he felt ripped off by the other design firm, especially that he bought chairs where the seats are 25" high. That's for a mid-height counter of 36" and his designer shows the counter at 42" which is normally bar height. This requires 32" high bar stools.

I'm waiting to hear back from them... either send a deposit and place an order or I move on. I cannot make the cabinets in half my normal delivery and cut corners just to fit their budget.

If they ask for any other adjustments in my product or price, my next comment will be "I'm sorry, there are no other options available. That would be like ordering a BMW with fabric seats. BMW doesn't offer fabric seats."

I blogged about the business reporting service called YELP where people can do reviews about their experiences with local companies, restaurants and professional services.
I recommend taking the reviews 'with a grain of salt' as many are spawned out of anger.

Last year I booked an appointment at the eye doctor for a yearly exam. I missed the previous year due to COVID. The company is listed on my insurance and they have several offices in South Florida with one about a mile from my house. Expecting the service to be covered in 2021, everything was good until they called to reschedule because the optometrist decided to take a vacation. I got bumped to January.
Too late to find another service, I agreed to the 2022 date. After the exam, I didn't want to wait to order glasses as there were 5 or 6 people in front of me. Checking their website, there was another center a few miles from my office. I made an appointment and went through the process of explaining what I wanted and didn't want from a new pair of glasses.

All I wanted was a simple thin black frame slightly taller than the readers I've been using for many years. It would be a progressive lens set mid height as most of the time they will be used for computer use. I didn't want the lenses coated as I found the finish deteriorated after a year and the plain lenses lasted 3-4 years. For some reason they only showed me a more expensive frame made from stainless steel.

I paid the balance after the insurance credit and told they would call me in 2 weeks.

After the 2 week wait, I called them, but no one answered the phone so I left a message... a few days in a row. This required a visit to the store to pick up my new glasses. For some reason they couldn't find my order. I didn't have the receipt with me so I got their email address and would send a copy for them to trace the order.

I found the receipt but looking carefully, it didn't have my name on it. The receipt for the credit card transaction was attached. I scanned this and sent it to store.
Not hearing from them, I returned to the store where the receptionist said they mistakenly used another clients name on the order. Okay, where are my glasses?
She told me they were ordered yesterday when I came it. My response was to cancel the order and refund my payment. They did.

I'm thinking about all the bad reviews this place had. Why didn't I listen?
Yeah, I'm the one telling people to check the Yelp reviews and avoid the ones that consistently get bad reviews.

It's time I do some planning for my future. COVID changed my plans of buying houses/condos in need of repair, doing renovations and selling/flipping them for profit.
House prices are off the scale and if you actually find one it's a bidding war to get it.
So my direction must change and I need to see the advice of a certified financial planner.
By coincidence, one of my clients is in the business...

I Wrote my first book, it is called The Wandering Souls, and it is not available for sale on all amazone platform/ website ...us, uk, fr, it, jp, and others you can find and buy a copy here and for the uk it is hope you enjoy it and i hope i do not brake any roles by posting this here
Regarding the book here it is a short description :

The story of a young boy named Ethan who believes that hi is reincarnated, but hi does not remember much of his previous life
and so his wish is to find a way to prove that reincarnation is real and to remember his first life. Then one day life
provides him with a chance that hi was waiting for, when his Father suffers a accident at work witch causes him to lose his
memory and makes him think his is someone else. When the boy and his mother visit him at the hospital the boy comes up with
a new theory that might help him in his quest and might change how the world sees things regarding memory loss and reincarnation
witch in Ethan's theory are related and connected. Now his journey begins in proving his theory and finding a way to remember
his previous life. If you want more buy the book, read it, enjoy it and let me know what you think about it

The new trend for aging musicians appears to be selling their music catalogs. I first heard about this when Bob Dylan sold his entire record catalog for an estimated $300 million. Many others have followed and today, I see Bruce Springsteen clocks in at an estimated $500 million.
Amazing...