Options installed a fitted office/study about three years ago for a Mr.W who works from home. He was delighted but, due to a growing family, decided to move house.

The study should have been an asset to the new owners but they needed the ground floor room as a bedroom for an elderly parent. The new owner sought our advice regarding removal of the study furniture and at the same time Mr. W asked us to quote for a fitted study in his new house. We suggested that we uplift the old furniture and design a new installation, partly from the old but incorporating a new bespoke dresser/radiator cover and a wardrobe for his motor cycle gear, neatly solving the problem for the new owner at the same time.

Mr. W’s new study cost less than half what it would have cost had we not recycled the old furniture. We could have sold Mr. W an all new study and doubled our order value but by taking the course we did, we achieved a very satisfied customer who has now ordered two sets of fitted wardrobes for the bedrooms in the new house.

Everyone’s a winner: the new house owner had the furniture removed for free, Mr.W saved around £2k on his new study, Options have a very satisfied customer and a new bedroom furniture order and the environment gets the benefit of some major recycling!

Just returned from a break and the first task is to produce a new ad for a life-style magazine.

A quick conference establishes that we will go with lots of images of fitted furniture to establish the fantastic breadth of the range, three shots of bedroom wardrobes (including sliding doors), two study/offices and a home cinema wall unit, roughly proportionate to our sales mix. Include a flash about our current “buy now, pay later” promotion and a few testimonials.

What about testimonials? Do they work? Do people believe them? Snake-oil salesmen always had a long list of “unsolicited testimonials”; can this make us look like a snake-oil salesman?

We do have hundreds, possibly thousands, of testimonials if you include the comments on our customer satisfaction questionnaires (are they by definition ’solicited’ rather than unsolicited?).  The vast majority are positive, the runaway favourite multiple choice questions are “Very Good” and “Excellent”, but it’s the “Any Other Comments” section that produces the real glow.

Yes, we do get some negative response (any company that tells you that they never have a dissatisfied client is telling porkies) and no, we don’t use those in our advertising.  However, as they happy customers outnumber the less than contented ones by about 100 to 1, we would need to show over a hundred testimonials to include one negative one in fair proportion.

We are certainly more honest than theatre and cinema promoters who often take the one or two positive words in a generally bad review and plaster them all over the bill boards.

All  the mix of testimonials, unsolicited letters and customer satisfaction questionnaires, unedited, are available in our offices for viewing.  And, I will include four or five of the best in my advert.  Will prospective customers comparing us with our competitors, like Hammonds and Neville Johnson, believe them? We all sell basically the same product, fitted furniture, and although we believe that ours is the only product that is truly bespoke; how is the client to judge who is likely to give them the highest level of satisfaction?

We all use testimonials and none of us cries “stinking fish” but how can I establish that our feedback is more reliable than others’? I guess that an invitation for anybody to come and see the originals is the only option.  Will any other fitted furniture manufacturer do the same?

At Options fitted furniture we  give a 10 year, insurance backed guarantee.

What’s that worth to the client? Obviously, the peace of mind that comes from knowing that the fitted bedroom or home study they have just invested in is good for a minimum of 10 years service; but you’d expect any reputable company to look after your furniture for a decent period after installation without the need for a written guarantee or an insurance policy, wouldn’t you?

Yes, you would expect that but it means more when your wardrobe or home cinema installer has the confidence to put his money where his mouth is and demonstrate his belief in the products longevity.  Can you imagine the nightmare of having to keep doing remedial work to the thousands of installations over a ten year period if the quality was at all suspect. Suppliers of shoddy goods do not give long guarantees.

In truth, very little does go wrong with built-in furniture if its well made and properly installed and the recalls under guarantee are few and far between.  However, when it is necessary to fix something many years later the brownie points available are unmeasurable.

I was recently called back to quote for replacing the doors on a sliding door wardrobe that we had installed 21 years ago and to supply a range of bespoke drawer units and a home entertainment area, not because it had worn out but simply ‘because it is looking dated’.  Of course, the client could have gone to Hammonds, Neville Johnson or any of our competitors but they came back to us. Why? Because one of the old wardrobe’s sliding door mechanisms had developed a fault 15 years after installation and well outside the 10 year guarantee.

What did we do? We repaired it free of charge, not because we had to but because it was the decent thing to do.

The cost to Options? Maybe £100 materials and labour. What’s a guarantee worth? When it brings an old customer back 21 years later - priceless!

Well, we finally took delivery of our new fitted furniture delivery van, decorated with a selection of fitted bedrooms, sliding door wardrobes, wall units and home offices it really looks the business. Its like seeing the Options showroom driving around.

It just had to be the dullest, greyest un-June like day when it arrived so the photos aren’t brilliant. I will try to take some more pictures but as it’s working flat out from 8 a.m. to night fall delivering the finest bespoke fitted furniture to lots of happy customers throughout London and the south east I might have difficulty catching up with it.

One thing’s for sure, Paul the driver has nowhere to hide; he is very high profile from now on.

I saw a Google ad from Hammonds this morning; is said ‘No false discounts, just fair pricing’.

Last night I visited a client who had had quotes from Sharps and Hammonds.

The Hammonds salesman went in first, designed the room, priced it up, deducted the current ’special offer’ discount and then delivered the coup de grace: “Here is a letter from our managing director (all neatly typed up on a Hammond’s letterhead) saying “As we have reached out annual sales target, all further business in the current trading year can be discounted by an extra 10%”. How nice thought the client “We have Sharps coming tomorrow and will get back to you after we have compared the prices”.

The next night, the Sharps salesman created an identical design; “That will cost you an arm and a leg” said Mr Sharps, “but as we have are having half price sale that ends tomorrow (yawn) its only an arm if you sign up tonight”. The client hesitated. “Better still”, said Mr Sharps producing a letter from the managing director, all neatly typed up on a Sharp’s letterhead and saying “As we have reached out annual sales target, all further business in the current trading year can be discounted by an extra 10%”.

You can’t beat the old ones but what does this say about our competitors respect for the client?

Has anybody had a similar experience?

It occurs to me that as the amount of business we do through interior designers keeps growing and as we are currently revamping our showroom, we have a great opportunity to establish a working relationship with an interior designer starting out in Surrey or SW London and in need of showroom space.

There should be no conflict of interest and we can offer showroom facilities and an established client list of thousands.  Our clients are in main affluent home owners and perfect prospective clients for an interior designer.

We could benefit from offering a more in depth service and the ‘interior designer’s touch’ would flatter the showroom.  Sounds win - win to me.

Any takers?

Forgive me for ‘own trumpet blowing’ but testimonials don’t come any better than this; I will leave it to speak for itself:

****************
Bexley,
Kent
DA5 ***
12th May 2008

Mr.P.Kirby,
Options Furniture,
37, Grace Business Centre,
Willow Lane,
Mitcham,
Surrey
CR4 4TU

Dear Pat and your Team,

Well! What can say, the experience of using Options has been one of a pleasure from beginning to end and therefore it must not go unrecognised the level of service you give. Points to commend:

1. An inviting website site that was easy to read.

2. Quick response to my enquiry.

3. Appointment booked within the week of my enquiry.

4. Pat, you turned up totally annihilated my ideas and vision for this bedroom (to our advantage).

5. The rough plan you said would be with us within the week, it was.

6. You invited us to the showroom to see the set up, we had a tour around the
factory.

7. The Option team were extremely pleasant and helpful; we were made a cup of coffee with a cup and saucer!

8. We paid our deposit and you then organised a surveyor to come and measure more accurately and also to make sure you did your job properly, guess what,
you were spot on.

9. We then paid a further deposit in order to commence production; all this was explained to us by letter before David the surveyors’ arrival.

10. The room plan was sent to us within days with the additions we had asked
along with an estimated date of delivery and fitting.

11. Then it all went quiet, mainly because you had thoroughly explained every aspect to us, we understood every little detail, the plans you had issued gave extensive vision to the end product, we didn’t need to contact you with questions about our forthcoming order, an amazing service. You even called halfway through production to let us know how it was going and to also tell us you were on schedule to deliver on the day you had given us. How fantastic was that!

12. You then sent us through all the details of the Consumer Protection Association, a FSA authorised organisation, which gives us extra security with our order.

13. You called us the week before to let us know the estimated time the fitter would arrive, you wrote to us again to let us know the closing balance and how it was to be paid.

14. The fitter arrived 8am of the said morning followed by the delivery shortly afterwards. The delivery guys were extremely polite and careful when delivering the items to the room. They introduced themselves, what extremely courteous guys.

15. Paul the fitter, checked his plans with ours before he started the job to make
sure there were no variations.

16. Paul explained his plan of work and estimated a three day installation of which he was correct.

17. His work was clean and tidy, very little disruption, ie dust etc. Left the bedroom clean and tidy when he left for the day. Was polite and never stopped work the whole time he was here.

18. The fitted wardrobes have been fitted to the highest degree of craftsmanship, we cannot fault them in any way.

So there you have it, our testimonial is complete. I am sorry if it is long winded but I felt it deserved time spent on it, the same way I feel you Options Furniture as a whole have spent time on our order.

Thank you so much Pat and to everyone working at or with Options Bespoke Furniture.

Regards,

Pam & Peter S**********

Please give our details to prospective customers.

Cq.encl.

We always send our clients a “satisfaction” questionnaire to complete after the installation.

This provides us with  a lot of useful input to up-our-game.

I particular liked a comment on one this week; when asked “how could we improve our service” the client replied “only by giving it away for free”.

Thanks John, that raised a smile.

Tuesday.

Took a delightful drive in the spring sunshine, hood down on the MG, to see a prospective client in rural Rutland, a 51/2 hour round drive and an 11 hour day.

This is a bit outside our normal geographical area but well worth the trip providing I pre-qualify the enquiry to ensure that we can meet the clients’ requirements (if we can’t, who can?) and that they have a reasonable understanding of the potential cost.

In he event, I returned with an order and the realistic prospect of a larger order if they are pleased with the first installation (and they will be).

It was a very complicated design in a 16th century cottage with a plethora of slopes and angles. All went well but we had a slight stumble when it came to the exterior finish; no problem with the door design, colour or quality but, as happens occasionally the clients felt that our high-tech, satin lacquer finish might look to “new” in their beautiful thatched cottage. As ever, we have the solution: In spite of us spending years and serious money perfecting our spray plant to eliminate all imperfections, we can take a step backwards by applying the first, primer coat with a brush. The end result is that, although the final finish is still as tough as ever and guaranteed for 10 years, it looks as if it has been applied by a master decorator with a paint brush. I am very confident that the finished effect will be just right and in empathy with the house.

Hopefully, I will get the opportunity to “drop-in” when passing through Rutland to admire the finished effect. It may not be cheap, but goodness, we go to every possible length to get it right.

It’s a glorious Spring Saturday morning and I am in the office, on an hour’s notice, to meet a prospective client who has responded to a quotation I gave out two years ago.

This set me to thinking: there is a tradition in the direct selling of home-improvements industry that the best salesmen and women (or ‘designers’ as we prefer to be called) are those that “close ‘em on the night”.  The real ‘pros’ always ask for the order and don’t accept less than six nos before moving on.

2 hours later… We have completely redesigned the bedroom,  looked at a lot of variations on door type and finish and pushed the budget up by 25%.  We had the usual factory toour and the clients have now gone home to enjoy the rest of their weekend and ‘think about it’.

 ’Think about it’s are usually anathaema to sales professionals but for me the knowledge that the client has made a considered and, hopefully, the right decision is vital.  Happy clients come back and there is a home study on offer at a later date.

Some sales people would argue that I failed to ‘close’ the deal today.  However, I and all Options designers have a ‘conversion rate’ (more trade speak) of over 50% and when you consider that most people get three quotes (I think this client had four and mine was certainly not the cheapest) and factor in those who do nothing, the average conversion can only be between 25 and 33%.

We must be doing something right.