how to impress the customer

[DONNYBRASS]

hellow to all
I dont know if some of you have been thrue this which I am pretty sure. some of you have.
anyways here it goes my shop is in a the country area and my machines are in the garage and just recently I got this cutomer that I did a prototype part and know he would like some production made. but he would like to visit my shop. has any had the same issue where you have your shop in your garage and customers wanted to come over. how did you go about it .

[epineh]

I had something similiar, though different line of work, the main thing I went for was a clean shop, by clean I don't mean empty but neat and organized, make it look like everything has a place.

Good luck !

Russell.

[sharathchandar]

Hi donnybrass,
As far as I’m concerned, first invite your customer to your conference hall or your office room. Give a preliminary intro about your org and business by oral and by visual presentation. That should represent your past / current / future activities about your business area.
After seeing your prototype component, they decided to visit your shop isn’t it? Then, they really want to know your shop capacity / facility to fulfill their job order. So, explain your process flow in broad manner. That is mfg, inspection, packing. Particularly highlight your inspection and material handling area as much as you can. That will show your attitude about product quality. That is the one and only thing every customer expecting from supplier. Tell them, that… having a plan to introduce some advanced technology/ facility in future for customer satisfaction.

my advanced congratulations for your bright step, all the best!!!

[cam1]

Hi: Say what you do, and Do what you say. It's not always about the place, or about the tools,but it's always about the person, or people. Be proud of what you have achieved, and that will take you far.

best of luck

[dertsap]

Originally Posted by sharathchandar . Particularly highlight your inspection and material handling area as much as you can. That will show your attitude about product quality. !!!

thats great advise , the key is quality assurance


worn or broken tooling should be out of sight and your best tools in sight , scrap or setup parts should be clearly marked or even better tagged , any other parts that you are doing should be clean and free of burrs so if the customer is curious they can check out the parts and not get their hands dirty or worse cut
have a display of the various stuff you do and have the most complex parts in the clearest view


put the whiskey bottle in the cupboard out of clear view

good luck

[cob]

my biggest concern is that once they see that my shop is out in the country and not only that my garage is about 800 sq ft, my office is inside my house, they would get turn off and think I am not qualify to do there parts. but they where very happy with the prototype so I guess I will see what they think. for know I just going to clean and straighten out the shop. thanks for all the tips. if you have anyothers please. I will listen. thanks again

[cam1]

Shine up that shop!

[blackbeard52]

The best advice I could give is NOT to misrepresent your self. DONT make promises in you presentation of production capabilities than you cannot meet. I moved from a Small Corporation of 20 workers to a 2000 square foot warehouse with 1 worker and did exactly the same thing as you. I created a prototype for a local company in a week that they had been waiting for for over 3 months with others. It blew them away. Immediately they bought in but the corporate heads decided to send someone in to inspect my facility (its a pre-DOT.com thing). I had the same fears as you but in the end decided to go for it. They agreed to give me a try and I succeeded in the beginning but after a while production requirements exceeded my capabilities. As most businesses NEED to meet production, they went elsewhere because and only because I couldnt meet that requirement.

Some would say, Why didnt you ramp up employment and machines to meet that need? My answer is simply I didnt want to go back to that rat race.

my .001

Bob