2pm came & went. At
3pm I called her house again. I speak to the little girl again. She's
out- again. So I ask if daddy's there? I ask him if he knows where she
is because she's not answering her mobile & she was due to me for
an appointment at 2pm. I am then told she's ill. So I say, "oh so I
suppose she's hauled up in bed then?" And was told yes.
Great!
I had a Monday (30th) appointment who was made aware of the
wedding dates of the lady's who were booked in for the weekend before
her & that if they were to book, I may not have been able to
accommodate her. She provisionally booked Monday but said that given
this info she would keep looking & if she found something else she
liked she would go for it given the uncertainty of my situation. That
suited me, I don't think what she wanted was really my thing anyway
but clearly I shouldn't have shown any loyalty to first come, first
served with my 28/29th consultations because Monday girl did find
something else & cancelled & the weekend gals were no
shows.
I had a lady not bother to
show, cancel or apologise earlier in the year for a Bank Holiday Monday
consultation.
Possible
solutions?
A consultaion lasts
around 4 hours. What is the answer, charge a fee for appointments?
Or, take deposits for
appointments, refundable as long as the person attends or the
appointment is cancelled 24 hours or more in advance.
What would a client who
wishes to book an appointment & intends to show up, feel comfortable
with?
Here's the poll, please
let me know what you think.
And, if after this, you're not surveyed out. I have just
devised a more general one for visitors (if you feel
inclinded):
It should take no more than 10 minutes to fill
out:
Chantal Mallett's Main Survey.
___________________________________________________
24 November
2006 ~
Love,
Life & Surveys:
Well,
what can I say, the diary is a little thin this month. Suffice to say
that the friend I spent time with last month, chatting (& flirting)
away with in my workroom, while my scheduled gown appointment
stood me up is now my boyfriend, so whilst still being most aggrieved
that my Sunday 29th appointment didn't show or contact me
since to explain, I'm not sorry she didn't come
;) And right now I'm wearing a big fat coating
of happy teflon & nobody can do or say anything to unduly ruffle my
feathers right now. So for now, no gripes over crappy experiences with
retailers or bridezilla stories (oh & yes, he's read the diary
& still likes me! And in the spirit of being very honest with
each other, I'm not saying anything here he doesn't already
know).
The
survey above, on the subject of 'no shows' is throwing up some good
results. Of the brides that have taken the survey there is pretty much
an even split between returnable deposits of £50 or £100. I have also
had my clients email me regarding this to let me know it is quite normal
to put deposits down at beauty salons, etc. & some London
restaurants (how out of touch am I living in the country) & that
they would have been cool to pay a deposit. After all we are talking
about a deposit that is returnable whether you go on to order or not,
all it would mean is that brides commit to attending the appointment or
being responsible enough to cancel it. As someone put it to me, if
you're old enough to get married, your old enough to honour your
appointments. Ahhh, yes, in an ideal
world!
I'm
also finding the results of the bigger, main survey, interesting. How
interesting that nearly all respondents get less keen on the potential
source of their bridal gown the further away from the UK it is made.
It's not just China, India, etc. that seems undesirable but America too.
So far you ladies do not like your dresses being bought in from anywhere
in the world really & altered in the bridal shop, especially not
from the USA or China, etc. So all I can say is yikes! That's the
way most dresses in the UK are sold, the sources of many brands
are the US, far east, etc. & there are alot of British labels,
still fronted by the designers that founded them, that are owned
by one Chinese business man with production for these labels
in China.
I
also had an interesting comment for the question linked to
this:
| Is there any scenarios in the question above you
would not be happy with? |
|
- If 'Yes' - please elaborate: "Anything that
invoves excessive airmiles. I don't mind expensive but not to
literally cost the earth!!"
|
An interesting point. And if they're not being
flown in, they're coming in on containers- that's less polluting but
there is also the question of how we all feel about so much of
our goods being manufactured in places like China. Our manufacturing jobs
are being lost to Chinese workforces, telesales, call centres, tech
chat (thankyou AOL!), you name it is being contracted out to
India, etc. And of course every time we all buy something made in China,
& lets face it sometimes it's hard to avoid doing so even if you
wanted to, we condone China's record on human rights. Well, before this
diary sinks into depression, I will draw a line under my thoughts on
this for now. The
results so far for this question are
below:
|
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