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.

We’ve recently teamed up with a London based interior design company whose owner is very keen to offer his clients bespoke, one-off pieces of ultra modern living room furniture in high-gloss with bold colour combinations. check out the photo.

It’s not exactly ‘fitted’ furniture as we know it but because the pieces tend to be quite large we are assembling them in fixed positions on-site. You can’t see it on this picture but under the shelf at the back is a long narrow storage area for table insert flaps.

Anybody else out there in the market for an Options original?

A client recently asked if we do 3D illustrations. Because everything we make is bespoke, software clever enough for this is not yet available.

However, after the client had placed an order for living room wall units, I agreed to produce a one -off visual. See attached.

With the growing trend towards LCD and plasma screens together with surround sound and HD quality, there is a increasing demand for home cinema furniture.