Good day at the shop.

[cledry]

Weird and wonderful day at the shop. Super busy, more than normal. Probably cut 400+ keys alone. In the back installing 20 Auditcons on safes (what a piece of plastic crap) and a customer walks in and says if I can get him what he needs by the next day he will throw some business my way. I've heard that one before but a sale is a sale. He also starts out telling me what he pays for Best Grade 1 locks back where he lives. A quick call to my supplier tells me he is almost paying wholesale.

They have all but one item in stock. So I tell the guy give me 30 minutes and I'll let him know what I can do. He goes off to lunch with his wife and I get the old slide rule out to do some figurin'. He wants 8 Best Grade 1 locks, with construction cores, 8 LCN 4040, 8 kick plates, and 2 lite kits. Even if I only go 20 points on the big stuff and 30 on the small stuff it is a quick $1400. So I type up a quick estimate.

Back from lunch he mulls it over, has his laptop out on the phone etc. then he says OK but he needs it the following morning or no deal. I collect the payment in full and set about ordering. Then the issues started, the supplier wasn't picking up their phone on the sales. Finally I called an old number for the lady that used to be my salesperson at least 10 years ago at the same company. She picked up. I explained my situation after having a nice chat about old times. She told me she is now in charge of price matching for her company in an attempt to get more sales. I said in that case can you match this price on LCN closers that I pay at Security. She said she would. So I added another $320 to the $1400 profit just by trying that old number. She also said they would overnight the item that the order was short at no cost.

Called her back later and ordered 2 LCN 2033 that I had already quoted for another joband because of the new better rate I added $160 to the profit on that job.

Hoping the guy comes back to me for 75 Best levers and 75 LCN closers that his Florida contract is calling for!

[cledry]

Oops, overstated the initial profit, it was less but still a good $1050. It was with the additional $320 that it jumped over $1400.

[Locks+Picks_Happy]

This was a very cool story. Really heartwarming to hear about a good business doing quality work for its customers.

I wish you the best of luck on that follow up from the customer.

Cheers and thanks for sharing.

[MBI]

It's amazing what you can get at times, just by asking. Having a nice rapport doesn't hurt either.

[billdeserthills]

Good Job Cledry,
Nothing like breaking the thousand $$ mark in a Day! Back when I had an employee he would get $100 for breaking $1,000 in a day

[jeffmoss26]

I had the morning off so I went to visit my locksmith friend downtown.
I needed some Yale 8FL blanks (which he has a metric shitload of) for old Yale 840 railroad padlocks. Also had a double sided key made on his Sagar machine, never seen that one in use before. A police officer from the local transit authority came in and needed a barrel key made for a lock, looked like an old WB...very surprised they still use those locks!
They keep pretty busy with walk in traffic.

[Squelchtone]

Please consider becoming a forum Supporter with all that new found cash.

If you feel you've benefited from the forum over the years, we are always happy to accept support to help keep the lights on.

Thanks for considering, PM me for details,
Squelchtone

[cledry]

Consider it considered.