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Learn the best ways to handle customers who are unhappy with your shop's work.
Even the best decorators in the industry occasionally are confronted with customers who are unhappy with their work. Maybe it's the shop's fault, because the production staff used the wrong colors or placed the image incorrectly. Perhaps a customer provided incorrect or incomplete information. Or maybe a customer simply has unrealistic expectations about what his image should look like on a cotton T-shirt.
In any case, the real question isn't who's at fault. The issue is: How should you handle a dissatisfied customer? Should you reprint his work? And if so, should you do so at a discount charge -or for free? These are tough questions to deal with and ones that every decorator must be ready to answer.
NO HARM, NO FOUL
The best way to handle an unhappy customer is to keep him from being unhappy in the first place. Your biggest challenge in running a successful business is to always meet or exceed customers' expectations. As a custom decorator, it can be difficult to define a customer's expectations, as you are taking something vague and nebulous - an image from his mind's eye - and turning it into something tangible.
It's important to ask the right questions to determine the customer's expectations. Your goal, in part, is to figure out his perception of quality. It's helpful to have a written script containing questions that you and your staff walk through with every customer. Some of the questions are fairly obvious, such as who approves the artwork, what is the job's budget, etc. By asking the same questions every time - and documenting the answers - you greatly decrease the chances of failing to meet expectations.
Color correct. One upfront issue is that of color. Don't let a customer simply say, "I want red, green and blue ink on this shirt." The customer may be imagining a cardinal red, but you print a scarlet red. Get specific with the customer about the colors he wants. Show him color swatches and ask him to choose the shade he has in mind.
Consider it something of a red flag if a customer offers a color description, like jade, teal or...