Everyone has, at some point, made a regretful decision. Graphic designers love it when they can hit “Command-Z” — Undo! Unfortunately, that doesn’t always fly in real life.
Which leads me to a “tail” of woe about a switch I recently came to regret. It has to do with kites. That’s right — kites.
My husband and I have a beach store in West Seattle, right on Alki Beach and when we opened last summer, we had a great kite supplier. There was a concern, though — they were all the way in North Carolina!
Logistically, shipping merchandise from across the country means the cost of transportation must factor into the selling price. The kites were of great quality, and in spite of the freight charge, they sold well.
But it left us wondering if there was a closer supplier.
We learned one of our local vendors offered kites and they were less expensive. ALSO, they gave us free shipping, which is, in the world of retail, is AWESOME! So we thought we’d give them a shot.
But their kites turned out to be cheaply made and the lack of quality reflected poorly on us, so it was back to the launch pad.
Last month when we were in Yorktown, VA, we discovered a store very similar to ours. They carried kites from our original supplier as well as a variety of kites from an Oregon company — just one state away! The Oregon kites were more expensive, but they were well made and we thought it would be cool to support another Northwest business. So we ordered some!
The problem is, the Oregon kites aren’t selling. They are too expensive.
Ultimately, it was like a Goldilocks déva vu — One vendor was too cheap; one was too expensive, and our first vendor was “just right.”
We had to try the others before we realized just how good we had it. Which meant a happy ending to this tale of #SwitchersRemorse.
PS. As a member of a very cool team of influencers for Verizon Wireless, I received compensation to think of this story in my life, and to write about it 🙂
A tip from my friend, Sara F. Hawkins: If you switched away from Verizon and are regretting it, don’t worry. They’re making it easy for customers to come back. For more information, head over to your local Verizon store and tell them you have #SwitchersRemorse.
A virtual tour of Alki Surf Shop:
http://on.bubb.li/274389aw5ievoklfvbnzzhi/
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Alki Beach photo © Terri Nakamura 2015
Porridge courtesy of Wikipedia/commons:
Alki Surf Shop: http://www.alkisurfshop.com
Terri Nakamura on Twitter: https://twitter.com/terrinakamura
Alki Surf Shop on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AlkiSurfShop
The Horsfall House on AirBNB: https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/1229224
More from Terri Nakamura: http://seattledesigner.blogspot.com/