A one-person business means...
That I have endless chores—this is not a retail store with employees
sitting at computer monitors waiting to engage in email chat with you. Some
people email their cell phone number stating "HEY BRO! CALL ME!!!"
Do
you think they would realize I don't own a cell phone? That I don't even have a
long distance calling plan? Or that I have lifeline telephone service? Do
you think they would understand that I have NEVER talked to a customer on
the phone? (this is all true)
There honestly is no one here to make off-venue deals with you, ship
to Romania or Australia, etc. This is a small farm—not the public library with paid
staff to answer every question posed by anonymous strangers. I barely
survive as a farmer by raising, from seed and cuttings, rare plants. Do you
have an idea of how much time, energy, and daily labor that requires? Few
people have any clue.
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Please read my website information
In grade school I was trained to read with comprehension and write coherent
compositions. But 40 years later the world has evolved into a verbal culture
where people cannot take the time to read the
information on this website. Everyone seems to want to spend 30 minutes
talking about something they could do in 2 or 3 minutes online. How
can a farmer be yakking all day to anonymous people on the phone?
People will waste time on the phone saying things they would never
put down in written form.
Yet, these anonymous people expect me to explain privately in email
the information already posted on this website.
Do they know, understand or appreciate that
I am a farmer with compost to make, plants to water, seedlings to transplant,
and a thousand other chores? Wouldn't you rather be outside with the
plants and cats?
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Time draining anonymous email
In a one-person business you have very little extra time to spare.
Why engage in email over material already on your website? 90% of
inquiries can be answered with just a URL to the material. People
don't read. They would rather hit the email link to ask you to
explain something they could read about for themselves—if they'd
bother to spend a few minutes scanning the website. Such emails
often start with shallow flattery, by the way—"I love your
website but how do you make potting soil?".
Dad made Mom pregnant...
The ultimate time wasting email was so ridiculous I have never
forgotten it. I still treasure the absurdity of it's brevity from a
nameless, faceless human; "How did you get your start?" Think about that!
Who is asking? No name, no address, nothing but a "hotmail' return
address. Is it from a 12 year old boy living on a farm in Oklahoma, or a
70 year old woman serving a life sentence in prison? You have no clue, and this anonymous person expects
me
to write an essay just for them? I was tempted to dash off "Dad
made Mom pregnant. How did you get your start?"
What were the motivations for Emily Dickenson's poetry?
On NPR one evening a college English professor discussed this
phenomena with anonymous email. It got my attention because his
experiences were so similar to mine (I was running an educational
website at the time). He noted that his college started a website
that included his email address. He could not believe the emails;
what one would have formerly asked of a librarian, to locate a book
on a subject, were now put to him. People somehow expected that
there was a staff of people waiting to answer questions—ones that
would take paragraphs to reply to.
At first he answered them. But he soon realized that after spending
1/2 an hour writing an essay about Emily Dickenson there was never a
reply. "Who are these people?" he wondered. Soon it dawned on
him that the Internet had spawned an insidious tool of anonymity;
one where a college professor was writing original material for
strangers who never even said thank you.
By the time he prepared the NPR editorial he treated such emails as
obnoxious wastes of time. The Professor realized he was being used
as a thankless shortcut. No one really cared about the subject—just
wanted to dupe from him material for a term paper, or homework
assignment.
Silence, an "auto-reply", or software generated links
No one with a website can personally answer customer emails. Try
emailing Amazon.com. Or eBay. Email any website and you will get
silence, an "auto-reply", or software generated links to URLs
containing the keywords you used. You will not get a reply from Jeff
Bezos who founded Amazon.com, or CEO John Donahoe of eBay. Anyone with a private website has to be equally vigilant of
their time; it can't be given away to strangers.
How much do you want for...?
I never make private deals because they are simply too time
consuming. Instead of making an offer such as "I need
shipping to this ZIP code, will pay by
Google Checkout, and would like to buy (whatever) for $50 including
shipping. Can you do that for me" The person instead asks
"How much do you want for
(whatever)." You may be thinking "Hey, why don't you just pitch prices to such
inquiries?" Because of past experiences—
• The person asking prices will almost never reply to the response,
or they do reply but want a better deal. It is like haggling at a
flea market except I can't see the person. Who am I dealing with? The
person could be a 9 year old boy or a 90 year old woman, a deadbeat,
someone in prison, located in Brazil, etc. Almost anyone can get a
Google or Yahoo email address, yet they never include their real
name & address.
Think about this for a second. If you own a retail shop customers
walk in. You greet each other, saying "Hello" face to face. But online
it is so anonymous that price inquiries are not a viable
communication. Is the emailer a competitor? Or simply someone
wasting your time? If you don't
believe that you should run a website for a
few years to see what the email is like! You will soon tire of making
price quotes to strange email addresses that never reply let alone
thank you for your time.
Or, after you make a price quote they spring a surprise such as "how much to ship to Romania?",
(or Canada, Australia,
China, Scotland, etc.) I can't do customs paperwork, etc. |
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SIMPLE RULES/TERMS |
• Google Checkout only. No
money orders, cash or checks.
• Shipping only to the credit card address. No exceptions.
• No post office boxes; FedEx Ground shipping (only at this time).
They can't deliver to a P.O. Box.
• Combined shipping—items paid at same time will be packed together
up to the "Oversize" limit (3-cubic feet) with any excess shipping
fees refunded back to your credit card. You can actually trust
that I do this.
• Tracking info—is emailed to you.
• No local pickup. No retail store. My home
is private property.
• USA sales only—no sales to Canada, China, Australia, Russia or
even regular old Europe. Its too expensive and complicated. Life is
hard enough so I try to keep it simple. |
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