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Happy Independence Day!
Rasmussen will be closed on Friday, July 3, 2020, in observance of Independence Day. We will be back to work on Monday, July 6 at 8:00 am Pacific time.
On Independence Day, July 4, I invite you to reflect on the bedrock principles of our great country:
- Liberty
- E Pluribus Unum (“From Many, One”)
- In God We Trust
This “American Trinity” is on every coin currently in circulation in the USA (check your change!).
A parting thought to ponder – perhaps our growing reliance on “cashless” transactions is not beneficial to furthering our country’s values. So, pass this along, especially to our younger citizens, and reinforce what has made this a great country for the past 244 years.
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What Would You Do?
Perhaps you have had a consumer visit your shop, one you have educated on product selection, and discussed pricing and availability – normal retail activity. Then they left to “think about it.” They later contacted you, asking you to “meet or beat” a price they received from another source. Yep, you have been “shopped”. Likely, Mr. Customer went online, but went beyond merely looking at the website; they actually contacted the retailer and negotiated in some manner. That is commerce, and is nothing that Rasmussen can influence without violating price fixing laws and restraint of trade.
So what Mr. Customer has done is made you an offer to purchase at the price offered by the other retailer. You have three options:
- Accept the offer and make the sale.
- Reject the offer outright. I caution against doing this, as Mr. Customer will likely never attempt to purchase from you again, including any of the other fine products you display and sell. His “Lifetime Value” to you would be $0.
- Counter the offer. That’s up to you what to offer. Perhaps it is service related, such as one free cleaning. Or the first tank of propane is on you. Or ???
You are in the driver’s seat. Think about it – if Mr. Customer wanted to buy from somebody else, he never would have contacted you again. He would have given the other retailer his credit card and you might never have known. But he came back to you. He has given you the opportunity to fulfill his needs, wants, and desires for the product purchase and your superior service.
Depending on how much time you have previously spent with Mr. Customer, your cost of lead acquisition is the difference between your quote and the other retailer’s quote. And if he tells his friends what a great deal he got, what a great deal that was for you. Referral business is great plus business!
The choice is yours on how to act with this opportunity, and what it could lead to in “Lifetime Value” of future purchases, future service contracts, future referrals, and overall goodwill. Choose wisely.
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What’s UP with UPS?
UPS remains our preferred package carrier. We wish to bring a few issues to your attention:
- UPS continues to suspend the UPS Service Guarantee (also referred to as the UPS Money Back Guarantee) for all shipments from any origin to any destination. So, if you ship via UPS-Next Day Air or UPS-2nd Day Air, or even just regular Ground, and UPS does not deliver “on time”, they will not refund the cost of the freight. You should allow sufficient time in the ordering and shipment process so you are not disappointed by too tight of a timeline or unexpected delays.
- UPS recently opened a brand new facility serving our area, with high-speed automated sorting and other state-of-the-art features. Unfortunately, there have been glitches, resulting in delays of one day to many days. For example, one shipment to California first went to New Jersey before finally being routed properly. Please temper your and your customer’s time expectations, and plan accordingly with plenty of cushion.
- Shipments with multiple packages are often delivered on different days. For example, a shipment of five cartons, which we shipped all on the same day, might have three delivered on Tuesday and the other two on Wednesday. There is nothing Rasmussen can do about this. What you can, and should, do is track the shipment (see the next bullet). Please note: unless you directed us to do otherwise, we always ship an order complete at the same time.
- Track your shipments at https://www.ups.com/track You will find the UPS Tracking Numbers to insert into this website in the Invoice we email or fax to you for each order. We send the invoices within one business day after shipment. If you wish to receive such invoices so you can track your shipments, please contact us with your email address (you will also receive Sales Order confirmations). We hope this information will bring clarity to some of the shipping issues you may have experienced. We also wish to empower you to track your own shipments to save you and us time.
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Quote of the Month
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness…
…And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
– Declaration of Independence, In Congress, July 4, 1776