Closet Designer | How To Pick a Company to Organize Your Closets
Chapter 3 The Sales Experience
Typically the first face to face experience a person has with a company that he or she is considering to do work in their home occurs when the sales person comes a calling. Closet companies have different “titles” for their sales people: designers, sales designers, design specialists, closet designers, space planners…one company even refers to their representatives as “spacemen”. Well, pick a title that works for you, but these folks are essentially sales people and it is up to you to determine which of them actually know a lot about what they are doing and which are less experienced. This is actually quite important.
A lot of “designers” are not really designers at all.
They have little experience in designing anything and that lack of experience can work against you! Ask to see some examples of their work. Ask for references. Take a good look at the companies they represent. How long have they been in business? Do they have good records with the Better Business Bureau or perhaps a company like Angie’s List. Remember, you have to decide if what they are saying makes sense to you, so don’t be bashful about questioning their suggestions and find out if they have real answers or just canned sales presentations. Never forget, in the land of the blind the one eyed man is king! Logic never goes out of style.
Common Sense and Silly Stories
It is in your best interest to take certain things that sound implausible to you and qualify them as what I like to call “silly stories”. A lot of closet companies tell all kinds of silly stories. For example, do you really believe that installation is free? Of course not. The people who come to install your closets are getting paid and remember, you are paying them. I always find it kind of insulting when a company tries to get my order by telling me that installation is free this week only. It’s not. The cost of installation is included in the final price so why tell silly stories? The list price doesn’t matter, the “special price” doesn’t matter, the discount doesn’t matter, the only thing that matters in terms of price is the final net price. Period.
I like this one too…”This price is only good today, if you place your order right now”. Why? Do they need the business that badly? Are they afraid that if you talk with someone else you may find that the price or product or design they offered is not as good as they represent it to be? That kind of pressure tactic is offensive to me as a consumer because I see it only as a ploy to get a customer to do something precipitously that may not be in their best interest. Don’t fall for it, usually it’s not even close to being a good deal. After all, we’re not talking about Black Friday here, we’re talking about a project in your home and the awarding of an order for such a job should be measured and considered and not the result of a high pressure sales tactic.
