I needed some place to go and SCREAM about my insane customer who is trying to drive me insane! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
Wtf is wrong with people.....if anyone came into their business and nickeled and dimed them to death over ever detail on every cake, every time they order would they tell them to get lost? What makes a person think it's o.k. to be such a pain to anyone else ever? The world does not revolve around them!!!!!!!!!!!
How does it go, not my monkey, not my circus? I'm gonna shoot that damn monkey.....
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Original message sent by Stitches
I needed some place to go and SCREAM about my insane customer who is trying to drive me insane! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
Wtf is wrong with people.....if anyone came into their business and nickeled and dimed them to death over ever detail on every cake, every time they order would they tell them to get lost? What makes a person think it's o.k. to be such a pain to anyone else ever? The world does not revolve around them!!!!!!!!!!!
How does it go, not my monkey, not my circus? I'm gonna shoot that damn monkey.....
How dare you come on here with such a rant and not give details. Get it all out, Stitch! Talk about it! DISH IT!
AI'm gonna shoot that monkey!!! Lmaaaoooooooooooo I'm literally rolling on the ground lol. So funny!! Non cake people just don't get it. But I bet if this customer is giving you the business it's just her way. Try to remain calm
Thanks ever so much for introducing me to that little gem...might have to change my avatar
Every time this women orders a child's birthday cake from me she insists upon a 3 tiered cake. They are always more elaborate than my typical wedding cakes!
Each time, the same thing 19 or 20 emails from her (this cake has 24 emails so far). Sooner or later I'm going to have to charge customers per email (seriously). She sends me 6 or 7 photos showing me parts of cakes she wants in her design. I tell her which are the least expensive options of the cakes she's shown me. Than she makes some little adjustment or asks me if I can make a cake smaller than a cupcake, turn it upside down and frost and decorate it as one tier so she can have the cupcake price instead of a tiered cake price.
She doesn't want to pay for fondant but she want's a navy blue and royal red tiers. I tell her no a million times, it has to be fondant I can't frost a perfect navy blue butter cream tier. 3 emails later she concedes to the fondant being more money because she has to have the right color.
Than after all this design bs I send her an invoice and she emails me back that I've quoted my prices wrong. Every single cake order she tells me my pricing is wrong. I straight that out and resend previous emails with pricing. Ah, look at the last cake I did for you, it's the same price but you've now added bigger tiers and fondant so of course it costs more.
Today, I get this Oh--Ok--Have some serious sticker shock--Trying to see what I can do--Could you give me a revised total with doing 5/7/9" cakes? Otherwise--I think Im going to just do a 2 tier--Thanks
Her cake planning takes weeks even months. Than suddenly it does end and she writes a lovely review of me and the cake.........and we keep going on this merry go round.
She's starting a photography business and I hope all her customers are EXACTLY like her. I hope she gets nickeled and dimed to death!
AI think you need to introduce a design fee, an adjustment fee, etc, etc...to be spplied at your discretion, ie. for painful clients like her....then give her the list of these fees at the beginning.
And then start applying them and watch her head implode!
Send her a revised invoice after each episode of harassment (sorry, adjustment in an email) and she might get the message.
Or maybe she's beyond help!
Here's a typical email from her (I edited out the child's name):
Hi Wendy--Thanks for all the info==Was trying to brain storm a bit--Trying to figure out cake servings--____cake was pretty much the perfect size--And I loved the "feel" of 3 tiers--Because it had the cupcake on top-----Was trying to figure out a small topper--Like the jumbo cupcake--But obviously not a cupcake--Something a bit more boy/masculine--I recall I think for ___ first I did the 5"/8"/11" and I remember using the 5" for her smash cake--And dumping most of it--Which is just criminal--with how good your cakes are--Do you have any suggestions? Do you do a mini cake? Smash cake size? Or could you make a jumbo cupcake(s) and somehow make/shave/ invert on each other --into something that looks like a small/mini layer? Just hate using a whole 5" for a smash cake--and pretty much wasting that money--you know? Open to suggestions---Thanks!! --Becca
I highlighted the red part. It's not o.k to waste her money but it is o.k. to waste my time........because my time isn't worth money, right?
ASounds very frustrating.
I quoted for a Noah's Ark themed cake, and the client emailed back wanting to know EXACTLY what detail the quote included. I felt like she was setting me up to start crunching me on price - 'How much WITHOUT the wood effect on the roof? What if I remove the bow from the female elephant?' Or some such ridiculousness.
I emailed back and told her my quote is for an overall 'concept', inspired by her supplied photos, and I don't go into pricing details separately or providing a list of specific details which will be included.
If she wants cheaper, I can lower the quote and will change the design accordingly, but the changes will be at my discretion, to suit the new quote.
If she wants to haggle over minute details to save a few dollars here and there, she can find someone else. (I didn't put this part in my actual message. LOL!)
She ended up messaging me back accepting the quote and giving me the go ahead.
AInverted cupcake. Ha! That's hilarious!.......... But, poor Stitch. :( I bet you daydream about the things you'd like to email back to her. BUT, if she's likely to write a good review, I guess those are worth a little extra patience. Here's wishing you the patience of a Tibetan Monk. Good luck.
I have a similar client. She only stopped e-mailing daily about miniscule issues when her husband gave her the wrong info about how big the cake slices would be and I immediately proved him wrong. I got the sense that he was the driving force behind her foolishness.
I spent so much time researching and e-mailing her on this last cake that I've decided that I'll no longer be available to her--it's too costly in terms of time.
IF I wanted to keep her as a client, I'd explain to her that since she's had my cakes before, we have to reach a point where she can trust me enough on design and pricing to let go of it once we come to terms about servings needed, etc. and that repeated changes will cost MORE than she will save in undercutting small details.
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Original message sent by maybenot
IF I wanted to keep her as a client, I'd explain to her that since she's had my cakes before, we have to reach a point where she can trust me enough on design and pricing to let go of it once we come to terms about servings needed, etc. and that repeated changes will cost MORE than she will save in undercutting small details.
What a pain! I think I would just send her an image of a cake that says "buh bye…"
Stop taking the abuse let her know in no uncertain terms what your perameters are for cake requests. If you keep allowing her to be the way she is then she will continue…
is it worth it to you?
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What a pain! I think I would just send her an image of a cake that says "buh bye…"
Stop taking the abuse let her know in no uncertain terms what your perameters are for cake requests. If you keep allowing her to be the way she is then she will continue…
is it worth it to you?
I don't make enough money to turn it down. Everyone has a boss. Whenever I get cocky god/life has a way of kicking me in the butt.
It's the cheap part that offends me and makes me scream. In her general life she is a bargainer type person, and I'm not. I don't even like to shop discount stores. I buy very little, but what I buy I want quality not quantity.
With my beauty shop clients, I let go of them. With cake clients, like these, I let go of them. It isn,t worth any amount of money to keep them. They only burn you out. I just tell them kindly, it will be best for you and me to go elsewhere. You just have to learn to say NO. You will sleep much better. Hate you go thru this. So , now Let Go.You will never regret it. !!
She's either seeking attention as a stay home Mom or she can't pay attention...something like that. She seems intelligent in person and when talking about other things, but in her emails to me she doesn't remember my answer from one email to the next. I feel like this is a pricing game and if she asks me the same thing enough times I'll screw up my answer to her, and than she can use that to get something cheaper from me. Seriously, I know she isn't this stupid in real life!
Now I know this isn't black and white (but everyone else has caught on) but look at my web page http://realcakeinc.com/menus-1/ Do you think the "additional premium flavors" cost the same or more than the "standard cake flavors"? I've told her the answer to that question every time she buys a cake which is WHY she always only gets the cheaper standard flavors. But yet again, today she asked me if they are all the same price. I'M SCREAMING AGAIN!
I can barely bring myself to respond to her question politely.
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Now I know this isn't black and white (but everyone else has caught on) but look at my web page http://realcakeinc.com/menus-1/ Do you think the "additional premium flavors" cost the same or more than the "standard cake flavors"? I've told her the answer to that question every time she buys a cake which is WHY she always only gets the cheaper standard flavors. But yet again, today she asked me if they are all the same price. I'M SCREAMING AGAIN!
I can barely bring myself to respond to her question politely.
So don't respond to her politely, attach your response to that question with your previous responses. Just be like "if you look back, to these attached emails you will see I have answered this several times and the policy has not changed"...its just enough to get the point across.
yes to what gingerlocks said--
i had a client who would call and blablablablabla blablabla and call some more and 'can you do this' and 'can you do that', 'oh you're the best' and on & on--when she finally decided and i would quote her a price she'd wait a bit and call back & 'could you just add' this & that & add on all this other stuff and she would poo poo the original order--"oh i don't want it to look like a grocery store cake" -- that last sentence got her fired as a customer --
sounds like that where she's trying her best to get you off guard and get a big bargain price for an elaborate premium cake -- sounds like she's just trying to wear you out so she can pounce
I have a client who's exactly like this other than the pricing thing, and she KNOWS that she's insane, so she's apologetic about it. I did her wedding cake,and I've done her son's birthday cakes since he was two. He's about 7 now, and she starts sending me emails every day starting in about February for an April birthday. They're usually about three or four paragraphs long with rambling details about what she's looking for, what he likes this year as far as his interests go, blah blah blah. I've learned to just leave her emails alone until she writes a couple of times, then send a short response back. She'll change her mind a few times design-wise, then I suggest that she do a pinterest board to show me what she's thinking. That keeps her busy for a few days, then I tel her that I'll get back to her with some ideas. This goes on for a couple of months but I charge her extra and she doesn't care.
This year i ended up telling her to come meet me at my office one day before I was doing tasting appointments, and I was able to nail everything down. Maybe you need to do that, just tell your loon that you need to talk to her in person because of the heavy volume of emails and you think it will be easier to just get everything on paper once. Then tell her that any changes will incur a fee and charge her for it. I did that to one bride who repeatedly had me sending the flavor chart or copies of the contract or something...She stopped asking for changes after that.
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Originally Posted by costumeczar
This year i ended up telling her to come meet me at my office one day before I was doing tasting appointments, and I was able to nail everything down. Maybe you need to do that, just tell your loon that you need to talk to her in person because of the heavy volume of emails and you think it will be easier to just get everything on paper once. Then tell her that any changes will incur a fee and charge her for it. I did that to one bride who repeatedly had me sending the flavor chart or copies of the contract or something...She stopped asking for changes after that.
Brilliant! Do this.
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She's either seeking attention as a stay home Mom or she can't pay attention...something like that. She seems intelligent in person and when talking about other things, but in her emails to me she doesn't remember my answer from one email to the next. I feel like this is a pricing game and if she asks me the same thing enough times I'll screw up my answer to her, and than she can use that to get something cheaper from me. Seriously, I know she isn't this stupid in real life!
Now I know this isn't black and white (but everyone else has caught on) but look at my web page http://realcakeinc.com/menus-1/ Do you think the "additional premium flavors" cost the same or more than the "standard cake flavors"? I've told her the answer to that question every time she buys a cake which is WHY she always only gets the cheaper standard flavors. But yet again, today she asked me if they are all the same price. I'M SCREAMING AGAIN!
I can barely bring myself to respond to her question politely.
Your website is great and very clear. Though once it loaded I started at your header picture for a couple of minutes just imagining how good those cakes taste!
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Originally Posted by costumeczar 
This year i ended up telling her to come meet me at my office one day before I was doing tasting appointments, and I was able to nail everything down. Maybe you need to do that, just tell your loon that you need to talk to her in person because of the heavy volume of emails and you think it will be easier to just get everything on paper once. Then tell her that any changes will incur a fee and charge her for it. I did that to one bride who repeatedly had me sending the flavor chart or copies of the contract or something...She stopped asking for changes after that.
I concur! ;) The email you quoted from her absolutely made my head spin! I would have to try to (as nicely as I can) tell her that her emails are more confusing than helpful and that it would be lovely to sit and have a real discussion with her instead of spending days/weeks emailing back and forth. It would stop wasting your time and hopefully save you some sanity.
I don't think your website is completely unclear to those of us with common sense. Additional Premium tends to mean it costs more. Maybe it's unclear for the simple minded?
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No, not unclear. Just a haggling customer who believes "sweetly" if they "don't understand" that the baker will just "throw it in" to stop discussing it. Much like a tantrum throwing 2 year old. The baker needs to just say "no", or just say, "Sure, that additional detail is $25".
You do realize some people just don't enjoy life if they don't price haggle everything...and the rest of us get dragged into their world.Watched some guy at Wingstop argue about a dip sauce. They are 50 cents. He bought one. After his family of 4 (yes, 4 using one little cup) ran out he went up with his empty cup, complaining he needed more ("It wasn't full...blah, blah, blah). The counter help got so sick of arguing with him, they just handed another one over. Free. <sigh>
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Originally Posted by johnson6ofus
You do realize some people just don't enjoy life if they don't price haggle everything...and the rest of us get dragged into their world.Watched some guy at Wingstop argue about a dip sauce. They are 50 cents. He bought one. After his family of 4 (yes, 4 using one little cup) ran out he went up with his empty cup, complaining he needed more ("It wasn't full...blah, blah, blah). The counter help got so sick of arguing with him, they just handed another one over. Free. <sigh>
Oh, yes. I've seen it a million times in the fat---I mean fast food industry. Thankfully I'm out of that business! One time I had a lady eat all but two or three of her chili cheese fries and then come to me complaining that she had found a hair in her food. The hair had no chili or cheese on it whatsoever and had clearly been put in the container AFTER she ate her food. I mean, come on! How do you miss a long blonde hair until you get to the bottom of the container in the first place? And then demand a refund after eating almost all of it? Not to mention no one in the kitchen had blonde hair. Go figure.
And I agree about the website not being unclear. I was just being facetious (childish, I know) because people like that annoy the bejeezus out of me. o.O
Love the monkey comment! I have only had one similar customer and I was so shocked when she came bake to me a second and third time! I thought for sure it would have been a one time deal.. She is actually very nice just difficult to do business with. I feel you though, it is very exhausting! Take a deep breath and say a prayer!
I have charged more just because the person has irritated me..
Sometimes by the time the emails go back and forth a billion times, I'm exhausted by their nonsense and charge like a wounded bull.
One girl drove me bananas, I doubled the price and she still ordered...Crazy people do crazy things..
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