On service, expectations, big business and handcraft

This post was intended to be in reply to tksteingraber’s usb cable hostage thread but it got closed. Thing is, I had important things to add that I hope the moderators will allow, as I believe it contributes to a vital conversation that needs to be had. First, to tksteingraber, I don’t actually know anyone in Florida who could have approached Brad, I just wanted to make a last attempt to salvage what I thought was a lost cause.

In any case, you, mitch2, and countless others are not unwarranted in your feelings about how a successful business should be run, lying to customers, or any display of recalcitrance towards service - with only just this side note….those like brad who hand make every single product on their own, dont churn out orders the way a commercial enterprise would - with some balanced consideration, would it be fair to have them treated to the same standards of service as a commercial brand? 

Please understand, I’m not offering bad service any excuses - I’m only offering my way of assessing it all for myself. You see, in every single one of my correspondence with Brad, even when I was at frustration’s end, I conducted every one of my emails with absolute regard for his time and the effort he puts to his work. In fact, the first word of negativity I displayed was over my first post on your thread 😂 - and after that, over my email letting him know about my discovery of your thread, even then did I merely notify him about the thread, and my concern he had treated others badly too, in asking for reply from him before I requested a friend to pick up my refund. Prior to all that, when he had completely stopped responding, I wrote him a pretty heartfelt email to express my gratitude for his time and work, and that if there was anything I had done to cause him anger or irritation over my order, or any lack of regard for his efforts, and if I had, that he would pardon it. You see, from what I had read of his work, I suspected he wasn’t your usual audiodude off the production line, and solitary people like that tend to be somewhat impatient and sensitive, eccentric even, to everything around them, aside from what they do best, the work itself. I also suspect that over time, with the impatience we have all developed over wanting to be served, expecting to be served and then demanding service, that we often forget the most ordinary and commercial things in life don’t require patience - and we express our frustrations with the power of words that slowly wear down the receiver. And with receivers with temperaments the likes of those whose work we actually seek most….well, I hope you see that other side of the coin.

Once again, I do not support bad service, and please do not take my words to mean such! : ) - I just thought it would be good to discuss that other side of things, that in this world of customer service and big business America birthed and expects, that the power of words can gradually wear down and destroy the few things left that once made the United States great. It would account for Brad’s slow descent from the goodness sns used to experience.

In friendship - kevin