That new client of mine has decided that they want to postpone their appointment with me today and meet at a later date.
I smell a potential project cancellation is imminent.
For a couple who has emphasis to me that they are rushing to start the renovation soon, it doesn't make sense for them to want to postpone the design meetings, if anything, they should be requesting to meet earlier and more frequently. The wife told me she will arrange for another date and let me know again, I have a feeling that she won't actually be reaching out again.
I have done the 3D Renderings for their place and I do quite like the overall theme they are looking at, so those completed renderings would be a great addition to my online 3D rendering portfolio. I will see how it goes next week, if there is still no updates from the wife next week, I will drop a courtesy text to essentially have her confirm that she is no longer interested, inform my admin that the project has been dropped and proceed with my job hunt again. I will also only add the renderings up on my portfolio maybe a month or two from now, when they have started their renovation journey with someone else, just so when I do put it up, it will be too late for them to steal the design and ask their own contractor to replicate.
Ultimately I also think it is for the best for them to engage someone else, I do feel an extra level of stress knowing that they chose me despite me being the most expensive option, it feels like I have to prove myself to them that they have made the right choice even though my price isn't actually "high", the other 2 companies they have shortlisted I believe are baiting them with a low price and will either scrimp on the materials used or charge them a bunch of compulsory additional items later on to earn back the money.
Also met the Antoinette today and we were able to settle a few of the issues that were brought up, they were actually legit issues so my bad for assuming they were trying to be difficult, the husband has also agreed to pay up a portion of the outstanding amount, I gave them some goodwill discount so hopefully I can get that project settled as well.
I guess this means I am pretty much almost done with any project related commitments, now it's a matter of not taking on anymore new projects for a while, I am planning to stop taking any customer leads from my company for maybe the next 2 months to really give myself a chance to look for a new job, this will also grant me a decent notice period should I get an interview and get asked about it. There is still one more client who might be reaching out to me soon, they were planning to engage me a few months back, but then their key collection date got delayed, so their plans to engage me has also been delayed, I am hoping to maybe get a few interviews in before they contact me again, just so I can have a better gauge of my resignation possibility and maybe direct them to my colleague instead.
It would be quite ironic if I actually do end up quitting my current line of work and start a new job within this Covid period because this is a time when people are losing their jobs. Fingers crossed I suppose.
Saturday, 27 June 2020
Wednesday, 24 June 2020
Pay Up!
My new bed frame from Hip Van has arrived, so has the little runner rug I added into the purchase to enjoy "free delivery". Bed frame cost $249 and the free delivery was for orders above $250.
It's a nice addition to the room, but the space still feels a little bare, I am tempted to actually get some picture frames to put on the wall to fill up the empty space, might do that soon once I get a chance to maybe visit IKEA or something, but furniture wise I think the space is pretty much filled.
My company has also reopened, so I am now going back to reporting for Showroom duties once every 3 days, doing the same thing, just watching Youtube videos when I am not meeting clients, which at this point is 90% of the time. I have also gotten a new project, not so sure how I feel about that to be honest, the clients expressed interest last month, we finally met on Saturday and they verbally confirmed with me, but nothing has been signed yet, the deposit hasn't been paid yet, so it is technically not "official" at this point.
The wife actually reached out 2 days back, telling me she wasn't comfortable paying so much before the start of the renovation and I won't lie, a part of me was hoping that her discomfort would lead to the cancellation of the project, I didn't even try to negotiate allowing her to pay less, I just spit out facts and told her there was nothing I could do, explained to her that we needed to collect that much to ensure that we have enough money to purchase the material and labour for the renovation to start, she accepted that reason and I really didn't care, I mean it's great that you understand the reason, but if you decide to cancel on me, I honestly could not care less.
Anyway, I am suppose to meet her and her husband again on Saturday to run through the 3D and get them to sign the contract as well as pay up the deposit, once again, a part of me is wishing the wife will just drop me a text within the next 2 day expressing her disinterest and then cancelling the meeting. I do not want to handle any projects during this period because the manpower is so insanely low at this point, it is extremely difficult to arrange works.
I am stuck in the cycle again, getting this project means I am now stuck in the company until the project ends, and I have no idea how long that will take, this means I can't continue my job hunt until the project is successfully completed. It means that even if I were to get job interviews, chances are they won't be successful because my notice period is going to be too long, so I have actually restarted the cycle by accepting this new project.
My office finance department girl has also been messaging me daily asking me if the client has paid the deposit, if they have signed the contract, it's actually quite irritating because I told her I will update her when they have done it, but she keeps texting me EVERYDAY in the morning without fail.
FML.
A recruitment agency actually reached out recently and offered to send my profile to one of their clients for a 3D Visualizer position, it sounds interesting because it is focused on designing community based exhibition and small scale museum spaces, this means I am not technically working for a client, the client will be the company because it one of those charity organisation that "aims to educate the public" kind of company so I am hoping to be shortlisted and get an interview with the company, which is also why I am hoping the new clients will cancel.
Another huge headache I have to deal with right now is the Antoinette, I am now being pressured by my company to obtain the outstanding payment as soon as possible because the outstanding payment is HUGE, so much in fact that their project is currently labelled as "red", which means the project is currently at a loss, it is quite bad and honestly the first time my project has gotten to this point.
I reached out to the Antoinette over the weekend to request for a meeting, the wife doesn't give me a date but instead request for me to resend the quote so they can take a look at their outstanding amount, I send the quote to them, she responds that she has received it and then request for me to send more workers down to do more touch up, this is 2 months after the project has been completed, before the Circruit Breaker, we were already done with all the touch ups, everything was suppose to be completed and in a handover state, they were already getting their items shifted in, the only thing left for us was signing the final paperwork and settling the final payment, that was it, but then of course the Covid problem happened and everyone had to be quarantined so I was unable to reach out and when I reach out again, suddenly they need more guys to be send down to do touch up.
The touch up portion never ends with them.
Anyways, I arranged for the worker, updated them and then my manager calls me the next day, expressing his concern that the Antoinette's Project still has a large outstanding amount that needed to be settled. It didn't hit me how urgent the matter was until my own manager called me to check, so I reached out to the Antoinette again and this time gave them a date and a rough time and am now waiting for them to confirm with me. Whether they confirm or not, I am very likely going to drop by that timing anyway since I know they will be on site waiting for my workers to do the touch up for them.
Let's hope I can settle a majority of my work related issues on Saturday so my Sunday can be as relaxing as possible. All this stress is making me miss the Circuit Breaker Lockdown period when all I had to be stressed out about was personally experiencing the death of a video game character.
It's a nice addition to the room, but the space still feels a little bare, I am tempted to actually get some picture frames to put on the wall to fill up the empty space, might do that soon once I get a chance to maybe visit IKEA or something, but furniture wise I think the space is pretty much filled.
My company has also reopened, so I am now going back to reporting for Showroom duties once every 3 days, doing the same thing, just watching Youtube videos when I am not meeting clients, which at this point is 90% of the time. I have also gotten a new project, not so sure how I feel about that to be honest, the clients expressed interest last month, we finally met on Saturday and they verbally confirmed with me, but nothing has been signed yet, the deposit hasn't been paid yet, so it is technically not "official" at this point.
The wife actually reached out 2 days back, telling me she wasn't comfortable paying so much before the start of the renovation and I won't lie, a part of me was hoping that her discomfort would lead to the cancellation of the project, I didn't even try to negotiate allowing her to pay less, I just spit out facts and told her there was nothing I could do, explained to her that we needed to collect that much to ensure that we have enough money to purchase the material and labour for the renovation to start, she accepted that reason and I really didn't care, I mean it's great that you understand the reason, but if you decide to cancel on me, I honestly could not care less.
Anyway, I am suppose to meet her and her husband again on Saturday to run through the 3D and get them to sign the contract as well as pay up the deposit, once again, a part of me is wishing the wife will just drop me a text within the next 2 day expressing her disinterest and then cancelling the meeting. I do not want to handle any projects during this period because the manpower is so insanely low at this point, it is extremely difficult to arrange works.
I am stuck in the cycle again, getting this project means I am now stuck in the company until the project ends, and I have no idea how long that will take, this means I can't continue my job hunt until the project is successfully completed. It means that even if I were to get job interviews, chances are they won't be successful because my notice period is going to be too long, so I have actually restarted the cycle by accepting this new project.
My office finance department girl has also been messaging me daily asking me if the client has paid the deposit, if they have signed the contract, it's actually quite irritating because I told her I will update her when they have done it, but she keeps texting me EVERYDAY in the morning without fail.
FML.
A recruitment agency actually reached out recently and offered to send my profile to one of their clients for a 3D Visualizer position, it sounds interesting because it is focused on designing community based exhibition and small scale museum spaces, this means I am not technically working for a client, the client will be the company because it one of those charity organisation that "aims to educate the public" kind of company so I am hoping to be shortlisted and get an interview with the company, which is also why I am hoping the new clients will cancel.
Another huge headache I have to deal with right now is the Antoinette, I am now being pressured by my company to obtain the outstanding payment as soon as possible because the outstanding payment is HUGE, so much in fact that their project is currently labelled as "red", which means the project is currently at a loss, it is quite bad and honestly the first time my project has gotten to this point.
I reached out to the Antoinette over the weekend to request for a meeting, the wife doesn't give me a date but instead request for me to resend the quote so they can take a look at their outstanding amount, I send the quote to them, she responds that she has received it and then request for me to send more workers down to do more touch up, this is 2 months after the project has been completed, before the Circruit Breaker, we were already done with all the touch ups, everything was suppose to be completed and in a handover state, they were already getting their items shifted in, the only thing left for us was signing the final paperwork and settling the final payment, that was it, but then of course the Covid problem happened and everyone had to be quarantined so I was unable to reach out and when I reach out again, suddenly they need more guys to be send down to do touch up.
The touch up portion never ends with them.
Anyways, I arranged for the worker, updated them and then my manager calls me the next day, expressing his concern that the Antoinette's Project still has a large outstanding amount that needed to be settled. It didn't hit me how urgent the matter was until my own manager called me to check, so I reached out to the Antoinette again and this time gave them a date and a rough time and am now waiting for them to confirm with me. Whether they confirm or not, I am very likely going to drop by that timing anyway since I know they will be on site waiting for my workers to do the touch up for them.
Problem right now is I also have to meet with the new clients on Saturday, might have to schedule for an afternoon timing with them though, if the wife is still interested.
The Antoinette now have the habit of not reading my text, I am sure they read them through the notification but they don't bother opening the group chat to have the message marked as read, the husband is also no longer responding, the wife is the one who is doing all the responding, not sure what is up with the sudden change in dynamics there.
Sunday, 7 June 2020
Government Monies
In the month of June, I will be getting $600 from the government and another $200 award for achieving Marksman during my ICT Range back in February, it was one of those "redo until everyone gets Marksman" scenario, so everyone actually got the award, which was actually quite arduous because they split everyone into group detailing of 8 shooters and everyone's score will be averaged out, which meant if there was one guy who can't aim for shit, everyone's score will get dragged down.
Well, my group had one such guy who kept scoring really badly and during the third try, because we had to do the whole fucking exercise 3 times thanks to that guy, I was asked to switched places with him because the in-charges felt like the fox-hole I was in was easier for him, so we switched and we did ended up getting the Marksman, his aim was still shit and he scored the lowest out of all of us, but at least we were done, that being said, he was still literally being carried by all of us, but because that foxhole that he ended up taking was registered under my name, the "score", our scores were actually swapped and I actually had his shitty results reflected in my name.
Good thing is at the end of the day, because we are using the average score of the 8 of us in that detail, it didn't really affect us individually, but seeing the shit score against my name just made me feel very indignant about the whole thing.
Anyways, when we were told of the Marksman award, we were informed that the monetary award would be transferred to our bank accounts within 2 weeks, I think, but it didn't happen and it actually ended up taking 3 months, so pleasant surprise for me I suppose, I'm actually also a bit surprised that no one brought up the fact that their money hadn't come in yet during the final few days of my ICT on the third week.
That is $800 coming into my bank account for the month of June, which is very nice. Once my company finally officially opens again, I will be able to submit a few more completed projects to get my commission, so there is that for me to look forward to as well.
I haven't been getting any leads from my company at the moment as well because I told them I didn't want any during this period, I want to keep my options open for any job opportunities once the circuit breaker goes into Phase 2 or 3, which sounds like a dumb idea because people are currently losing their jobs and the economy is crashing so why would I think that that would be a good time to look for a job, I honestly do not know what my plans are, all I know is that during the last 2 months, I have had the best mental break I have ever had for a very long while since I started this job, existing clients are not reaching out to bring up renovation issues with me, sub-contractors are not sending me voice memos alerting me to problems they are facing, when my phone vibrates with a message, I don't get a mini panic attack, I am back to the same relaxing condition I was in when I was working for my Dad, except at that time, I was also getting paid a lot per month, which is something I am missing terribly.
Despite me not really trying to get any new projects during this period, I actually had an old lead reach out to me at the beginning of last month, confirming she wanted to engage me for my services, and after that short exchange, she told me she will collate the changes she wants to make in the quote and then update me again soon, which turns out to be 3 weeks later, so I took my time amending the quote once she send me the changes she wanted made, send the updated quote to her and I have not gotten any new updates since.
Not sure if she is still interested, personally I am have lost interest in it because I actually gave her a huge discount that has made the project honestly not worth my time anymore. I am low-key hoping she would just reach out and tell me she has decided to go with another Interior Designer because my price is too high, she has shown me the prices the other Interior Designers are charging and I am really quite surprise at how low so many of them are willing to go, I can only predict then when the project starts, they will start piling on a bunch of add-ons to make up for the low profit.
Anyways, I have also decided that since I will be getting $800 this month, it would be a good time to get a new bed frame. My current one, which is also my very first bed frame now that I think about it, has lasted me since Primary School and it is starting to fall apart, it is definitely high quality, the fact that it has lasted 2 decades is a testament to it, but it keeps squeaking every time I roll on my bed to find a comfortable sleeping position since a few years back, so it is definitely time to go.
Got one from HipVan, was written that the bed frame could be delivered on 9th June, so I decided to make the purchase and it was only when I had confirmed my order did I realize that all the delivery slots for the next 2 weeks were fully taken up and I could only get the frame on the 22nd. It is a decent bed frame but I am a bit bumped out that I have to wait so long.
Getting that new bed frame has also made me want to get more stuff to redecorate my room just because the only loose furniture in my bedroom right now that is making the whole place look so drab and dated is my current bed frame.
I really want to get full height mirrors, a new dresser table, some paintings to hang on the wall, a carpet, just so my room can look like the room of an Interior Designer, but all those items combined will cost quite a bit, so I will wait for the bed frame to come in first and then decide from there, I might end up getting the other items from IKEA, just because they have more options and it is a lot cheaper.
Well, my group had one such guy who kept scoring really badly and during the third try, because we had to do the whole fucking exercise 3 times thanks to that guy, I was asked to switched places with him because the in-charges felt like the fox-hole I was in was easier for him, so we switched and we did ended up getting the Marksman, his aim was still shit and he scored the lowest out of all of us, but at least we were done, that being said, he was still literally being carried by all of us, but because that foxhole that he ended up taking was registered under my name, the "score", our scores were actually swapped and I actually had his shitty results reflected in my name.
Good thing is at the end of the day, because we are using the average score of the 8 of us in that detail, it didn't really affect us individually, but seeing the shit score against my name just made me feel very indignant about the whole thing.
Anyways, when we were told of the Marksman award, we were informed that the monetary award would be transferred to our bank accounts within 2 weeks, I think, but it didn't happen and it actually ended up taking 3 months, so pleasant surprise for me I suppose, I'm actually also a bit surprised that no one brought up the fact that their money hadn't come in yet during the final few days of my ICT on the third week.
That is $800 coming into my bank account for the month of June, which is very nice. Once my company finally officially opens again, I will be able to submit a few more completed projects to get my commission, so there is that for me to look forward to as well.
I haven't been getting any leads from my company at the moment as well because I told them I didn't want any during this period, I want to keep my options open for any job opportunities once the circuit breaker goes into Phase 2 or 3, which sounds like a dumb idea because people are currently losing their jobs and the economy is crashing so why would I think that that would be a good time to look for a job, I honestly do not know what my plans are, all I know is that during the last 2 months, I have had the best mental break I have ever had for a very long while since I started this job, existing clients are not reaching out to bring up renovation issues with me, sub-contractors are not sending me voice memos alerting me to problems they are facing, when my phone vibrates with a message, I don't get a mini panic attack, I am back to the same relaxing condition I was in when I was working for my Dad, except at that time, I was also getting paid a lot per month, which is something I am missing terribly.
Despite me not really trying to get any new projects during this period, I actually had an old lead reach out to me at the beginning of last month, confirming she wanted to engage me for my services, and after that short exchange, she told me she will collate the changes she wants to make in the quote and then update me again soon, which turns out to be 3 weeks later, so I took my time amending the quote once she send me the changes she wanted made, send the updated quote to her and I have not gotten any new updates since.
Not sure if she is still interested, personally I am have lost interest in it because I actually gave her a huge discount that has made the project honestly not worth my time anymore. I am low-key hoping she would just reach out and tell me she has decided to go with another Interior Designer because my price is too high, she has shown me the prices the other Interior Designers are charging and I am really quite surprise at how low so many of them are willing to go, I can only predict then when the project starts, they will start piling on a bunch of add-ons to make up for the low profit.
Anyways, I have also decided that since I will be getting $800 this month, it would be a good time to get a new bed frame. My current one, which is also my very first bed frame now that I think about it, has lasted me since Primary School and it is starting to fall apart, it is definitely high quality, the fact that it has lasted 2 decades is a testament to it, but it keeps squeaking every time I roll on my bed to find a comfortable sleeping position since a few years back, so it is definitely time to go.
Got one from HipVan, was written that the bed frame could be delivered on 9th June, so I decided to make the purchase and it was only when I had confirmed my order did I realize that all the delivery slots for the next 2 weeks were fully taken up and I could only get the frame on the 22nd. It is a decent bed frame but I am a bit bumped out that I have to wait so long.
Getting that new bed frame has also made me want to get more stuff to redecorate my room just because the only loose furniture in my bedroom right now that is making the whole place look so drab and dated is my current bed frame.
I really want to get full height mirrors, a new dresser table, some paintings to hang on the wall, a carpet, just so my room can look like the room of an Interior Designer, but all those items combined will cost quite a bit, so I will wait for the bed frame to come in first and then decide from there, I might end up getting the other items from IKEA, just because they have more options and it is a lot cheaper.
Thursday, 28 May 2020
Red Dead Redemption 2
Just completed playing the final chapter of Red Dead Redemption 2 (not the epilogue) and I am actually feeling very sad right now.
Spoilers.
 |
| Arthur Morgan |
I knew the main character Arthur Morgan was eventually going to succumb to his tuberculosis and die in the end, but seeing the main character slowly getting worst physically as the story progressed was pretty gut wrenching, I got a lump in my throat when I was watching his "last ride", and then of course when he died, I mean the whole final portion of game was just so heartbreaking to play.
 |
| When he admits to a Nun that he is afraid of dying. Holy shit that is a tear jerker. |
There were actually still quite a few side missions for me to complete but I didn't have the heart to do them because of how haggard Arthur Morgan was starting to look.
I actually wanted to end the game as soon as possible so I could get the sad ending over and done with, but boy when they showed the "last ride", I was trying very hard to keep my composure and kept telling myself this was just a game, and then when he actually had his last breath at the end and they fast forward the game years later, I just felt empty that Arthur Morgan had passed on, I mean I have never actually felt so sad about a video game character dying before, this shit hits so hard.
I can now understand why this game was deemed a masterpiece because it actually made me feel for the character like no other game has.
To think I almost gave up on this game early on and wanted to get a refund to get Monster Hunter World Iceborne to play with my friend, although if I actually did that, I probably wouldn't be feeling so sad right now.
Update:
I have now fully completed the game and it just doesn't feel as good to play the other character Arthur Morgan actually saved in the end, not that the character is bad, I mean he is the main character in the very first Red Dead Redemption, but he isn't Arthur Morgan.
Sigh, the ending of the game is affecting me a lot more than it should, I could not play the epilogue portion of the game without feeling sad. I was hoping the game would bring up mentions of the character to alleviate the sadness, but when the other characters actually end up talking about it, it just made me even more sad.
End of Spoilers.
Sad stuff aside, there are some funny moments in the game, like when the player chooses to assault a feminist on the street and she fights back.
This is after the main story ends, so that character is actually the gang member Arthur Morgan saved and why his voice isn't as deep as Arthur Morgan.
I just find the initial interaction between him and the random NPC hilarious when he called her a mouse.
Gameplay wise, honestly the controls do feel a little bit clunky, the way the character moves doesn't feel very sharp but the in-game world is really something else and of course the star of the show is the story and the main character Arthur Morgan.
This is one of those games that you don't play for the gameplay, this is one of those games you play for the experience.
Saturday, 16 May 2020
Another Budget Bugger
So about a month back, I was given a few leads by my company and I think I didn't bother following up with at least 50% of them because they were pretty bad leads.
... and weeks later receive a small box with a rotten pear inside.
So anyways, I have already prepared the quote and it has definitely exceeded her budget by 150%, if I charge her lower,like dirt cheap, like I don't even get paid charity level kind of low, I can work around her budget, but alas, I am not a philanthropist, so NO. I don't even want to really send her the quote to be honest because I am afraid she will start to bargain and I am in no mood to get into a drawn out discussion with her about why her project is not worth any designer's time.
Most of them that I reached out to didn't bother responding, and the others that I didn't bother reaching out to had extremely unrealistic budget, a lot of the ones I didn't reach out to never really bothered calling the company to ask about the lack of follow up because most of them apply to meet up Interior Designers through renovation portals and they are always linked up to at least 6 different IDs, so having one out of the six not reach out is not really going to affect them too much and I guess most of them don't really want to spend their time talking to so many as well.
But there are times when some do reach out weeks later either through email like the customer I had blogged about previously or to the company to ask why the Interior Designer didn't reach out, well today, I had one who did the latter.
So I got her enquiry pretty much a few days after I got the leads of the customer I blogged about previously and at that time, I was already really unmotivated after that last lead and had given up on the company's lead having any sort of potential, this was 2 leads in a row that had the same issue, it was just too tiresome to even deal with, in the enquiry that was forwarded to me by my office admin, the owner was adamant about staying on her unrealistic budget, so I didn't bother reaching out because why waste the time? Eventually all the other Interior Designers from other companies who got assigned to entertain her will come to the same very conclusion and give her the very same answer, that her budget is simply not viable for the works she want done.
Weeks went by and I didn't get any complaints from the customer about my lack of response, so I updated the leads in the company's system and labelled it as "dropped", listing the reason as...
"Extremely unrealistic budget."
... everything was fine until today, when my company's admin suddenly messaged me and asked me if I had reached out to the customer, so I lied and said I did but she wasn't responsive and was immediately send a screenshot of the message the client had exchanged with the admin, asking when would be a good time to have a consultation session.
I wasn't feeling flustered about getting caught not following up with the client, I was actually more annoyed that I had to deal with that customer, my admin then told me the customer wants to have a video conference later in the evening and ask me if I was available, so I said I wasn't and that it would be great if she could reallocate the leads to someone else, because I didn't want to have to deal with leads that will ultimately be a waste of time. Unfortunately, my admin couldn't do that, so I told her very begrudgingly that I will liaise with the client directly.
I reach out to the client and told her I was sorry I got caught, did not reach out sooner, and then suggested that instead of a video call, she can just share her requirements with me via Whatsapp, because I didn't want to waste time doing a video call with a client that I know will go nowhere in the end, and thankfully, she agreed and shared her requirements.
Well, a month has passed since she first submitted her enquiries and her budget has dropped, but so has her requirements, and she sounded like she knew her budget was not feasible, so she told me she only wanted to do a single space and that was it. The budget she set aside was clearly still too low, but it was not as ridiculous as the last time, so I entertained her for a bit, got her requirements and in the end, despite her lowered renovation requirements, it was still a project that would result in a severe lack of profit margin for any designer who decides to take on the job.
I mean she has CLEARLY spoken to other designers and have gotten multiple quotes from them, that is why she knew her budget was insufficient and that was the main reason why she decided to reach out to me, because I was the only one left who hasn't entertained her, it is the exact same scenario as the other client, all the other designers very likely told her that her budget was not realistic, which is something I don't fucking get, multiple industry experts have already told you very clearly that your budget is insufficient, so why the hell are you still sticking to that?
Customers like these are the reason why there are so many horror stories of homeowners getting swindled, they are such an easy target because they are so desperate to look for prices that are too good to be true, it's just dumb.
It would be like me trying to get a new iPhone that retails at $1088, seeing a bunch of online stores selling at an average of between $988 - $1088, and then suddenly go to eBay and see a listing for that Brand New iPhone at $299 and think to myself..
"WOW WHAT A STEAL! I WILL BUY THIS IMMEDIATELY BEFORE ANYONE ELSE GETS IT.!"
... and weeks later receive a small box with a rotten pear inside.
So anyways, I have already prepared the quote and it has definitely exceeded her budget by 150%, if I charge her lower,like dirt cheap, like I don't even get paid charity level kind of low, I can work around her budget, but alas, I am not a philanthropist, so NO. I don't even want to really send her the quote to be honest because I am afraid she will start to bargain and I am in no mood to get into a drawn out discussion with her about why her project is not worth any designer's time.
Friday, 1 May 2020
Just Circuit Breaker Life Update
Haven't really been doing anything at home as well during this lockdown, spend a ridiculous amount of money ordering baked goods from Plain Vanilla because they had a free delivery if the order is above $45, I ordered twice within a spend of 1 week, effectively spending $100 on cakes and cupcakes.
They do not have a very long shelf life, so I had to finish everything I ordered within 2 to 3 days and by the third day, the cookie that I ordered to quality for the free delivery got dry af. The cookie wasn't really good if I were to be honest, the recipe I found online makes better ones.
After spending that crazy amount of money, I decided to start baking again, ordered a few baking ingredients from Phoon Huat, took 2 weeks to deliver over and when the delivery came, the cocoa powder and chocolate chips I ordered were out of stock, which was horrible because I wanted to make double chocolate chip cookies, I was actually really pissed off and wrote an angry email to Phoon Huat and they refunded me the money, as they should.
I just don't get why it is out of stock when I ordered those items 2 weeks back, a lot of items I wanted to order, like baking powder and vanilla extract, were listed as out of stock on the website, that means if a product is not available, it can't be placed in the cart, but the chocolate and cocoa powder could, which meant when I had ordered them, they were clearly in stock, I assume that if the product is in stock and I actually ordered those in-stock items, it will be reserved for me once the online payment has been made, but apparently not, so that was very disappointing, I ended up going to the mini mart at my condo car park and got a big bar of Cadbury to replace the missing chocolate chips. The cookies turned out great though.
It is really chunky.
They are suppose to be inspired by the Levain Bakery cookies from New York
This is how their cookie looked like and it was still surprisingly moist when I had it on the third day.
Honestly speaking, the cookies I made didn't really taste very similar, the texture was quite different from Levain, not that I am complaining because I actually prefer the texture from the cookie I made, which was a lot gooier, or maybe it is suppose to be similar and the Levain Cookies I had "dried out" and lost it's gooeyness.
After cookies, I made a lemon loaf cake as per my Mum's request, it came out fine, didn't really thought it was nice enough to take a picture so there is that.
I also made carrot cake.
It was meant to be a single loaf....
... but I had too much batter, so I made a few cupcakes. Good to know that my piping skills are still semi-decent.
Well, I got super impatient and made the rookie mistake of putting the frosting on the loaf cake before it completely cooled, thus the horrible mess. It was still really good though and one reason why I don't really tend to buy carrot cupcakes outside anymore because the recipe I have is bloody good. I will probably make another batch during this lockdown, and also maybe if possible banana bread and another lemon loaf.
Earlier during the lockdown, I also tried making Dalgona Coffee and was very successful.
It whipped up within 3 minutes thanks to a good hand whisk I owned. I made it at night though, so after I took this picture and had 3 sips, I just threw it away, plus this was with soy milk, so it also tasted gross.
Also a random photo of the doggo just because he has been a great source of entertainment and companionship during this lockdown.
Aside from baking, I have also been gaming and recently completed a game called Disco Elysium, which was pretty good once I actually stop treating it as a game and looked at it more as an interactive novel because that game has a lot of reading. Hated it at first, gave up and left a bad review, when I first bought it earlier this year, the review got 5 likes, but then came back again a few days back, gave it another go, treated it as a novel and ended up really liking it, so I deleted my review and left a positive one, that review currently has zero likes.
The game received "universal acclaimed", so there are plenty of good reviews about it and I was just really bitter when I couldn't enjoy the game like everyone did, that's why I left the bad review like the bitter fuck I was.
I am just fucking slow when it comes to appreciating good games, happened with Witcher 3 and Divinity 2 Original Sin, hated those games at first, didn't understand the appeal, but after giving them another shot, ended up getting the appeal and just got completely enamored by them and lucky me, the developer for Witcher 3 is coming up with a new game called Cyberpunk 2077 and the developer for Divinity 2 Original Sin is coming up with a new game called Baldur's Gate 3.
Well, now I have another game called Pillars of Eternity that I am wanting to love, so we'll see how that goes, or I might just get Red Dead Redemption 2 and enjoy that.
Cupcakes. (From my 2nd Order)
Loaf Cake (Also from my 2nd Order)
They do not have a very long shelf life, so I had to finish everything I ordered within 2 to 3 days and by the third day, the cookie that I ordered to quality for the free delivery got dry af. The cookie wasn't really good if I were to be honest, the recipe I found online makes better ones.
After spending that crazy amount of money, I decided to start baking again, ordered a few baking ingredients from Phoon Huat, took 2 weeks to deliver over and when the delivery came, the cocoa powder and chocolate chips I ordered were out of stock, which was horrible because I wanted to make double chocolate chip cookies, I was actually really pissed off and wrote an angry email to Phoon Huat and they refunded me the money, as they should.
I just don't get why it is out of stock when I ordered those items 2 weeks back, a lot of items I wanted to order, like baking powder and vanilla extract, were listed as out of stock on the website, that means if a product is not available, it can't be placed in the cart, but the chocolate and cocoa powder could, which meant when I had ordered them, they were clearly in stock, I assume that if the product is in stock and I actually ordered those in-stock items, it will be reserved for me once the online payment has been made, but apparently not, so that was very disappointing, I ended up going to the mini mart at my condo car park and got a big bar of Cadbury to replace the missing chocolate chips. The cookies turned out great though.
It is really chunky.
They are suppose to be inspired by the Levain Bakery cookies from New York
This place, which I visited, holy fuck, almost a year ago, I still vividly remember the queue and also the road smelling like piss.
This is how their cookie looked like and it was still surprisingly moist when I had it on the third day.
Honestly speaking, the cookies I made didn't really taste very similar, the texture was quite different from Levain, not that I am complaining because I actually prefer the texture from the cookie I made, which was a lot gooier, or maybe it is suppose to be similar and the Levain Cookies I had "dried out" and lost it's gooeyness.
After cookies, I made a lemon loaf cake as per my Mum's request, it came out fine, didn't really thought it was nice enough to take a picture so there is that.
I also made carrot cake.
It was meant to be a single loaf....
Well, I got super impatient and made the rookie mistake of putting the frosting on the loaf cake before it completely cooled, thus the horrible mess. It was still really good though and one reason why I don't really tend to buy carrot cupcakes outside anymore because the recipe I have is bloody good. I will probably make another batch during this lockdown, and also maybe if possible banana bread and another lemon loaf.
Earlier during the lockdown, I also tried making Dalgona Coffee and was very successful.
It whipped up within 3 minutes thanks to a good hand whisk I owned. I made it at night though, so after I took this picture and had 3 sips, I just threw it away, plus this was with soy milk, so it also tasted gross.
Also a random photo of the doggo just because he has been a great source of entertainment and companionship during this lockdown.
Aside from baking, I have also been gaming and recently completed a game called Disco Elysium, which was pretty good once I actually stop treating it as a game and looked at it more as an interactive novel because that game has a lot of reading. Hated it at first, gave up and left a bad review, when I first bought it earlier this year, the review got 5 likes, but then came back again a few days back, gave it another go, treated it as a novel and ended up really liking it, so I deleted my review and left a positive one, that review currently has zero likes.
The game received "universal acclaimed", so there are plenty of good reviews about it and I was just really bitter when I couldn't enjoy the game like everyone did, that's why I left the bad review like the bitter fuck I was.
I am just fucking slow when it comes to appreciating good games, happened with Witcher 3 and Divinity 2 Original Sin, hated those games at first, didn't understand the appeal, but after giving them another shot, ended up getting the appeal and just got completely enamored by them and lucky me, the developer for Witcher 3 is coming up with a new game called Cyberpunk 2077 and the developer for Divinity 2 Original Sin is coming up with a new game called Baldur's Gate 3.
Well, now I have another game called Pillars of Eternity that I am wanting to love, so we'll see how that goes, or I might just get Red Dead Redemption 2 and enjoy that.
Monday, 27 April 2020
Unrealistic Budget Buggers
So one of my customer leads from a month back suddenly dropped me an email today and in it, she dropped me a copy of her floorplan and shared with me that she would like to work with me and then gave me the colour scheme she was interested in.
My company has been giving me a relatively steady steam of customer leads, but I will say 90% of them are pretty much a waste of time, they are either unresponsive when reached out or they have a budget that is comically low, this particular client who reached out to me today belongs to the latter.
Back when the office gave me her enquiry, the renovation requirements didn't really state much, it had the basic information attached to the email, which is the type of apartment the client had and the budget, when I saw those 2 information and how much they did not tally together, I just immediately labelled it as a waste of time and didn't bother reaching out.
Normally our leads are distributed to us by renovation portals. When a customer reaches out to a renovation portal, their enquiry will get disseminated to an average of about 5 to 6 random interior design firms that matches their requirements, which is basically "budget conscious" or "willing to pay for design", no prize for guessing which category my company falls under. Anyways, I figured if 1 out of the 5 to 6 interior design firms didn't reach out to her, she probably wouldn't even notice, so I dropped her as a potential customer lead the moment I got my hands on her requirements.
Well, she reached out today and I was honestly surprised because it has already been a month since I got her information and there was no prior contact from my end to her, so the only possibility could be that she either really wants to engage my company for her renovation services or she has spoken to all the other interior design firms and they have turned her down because of her unrealistic budget.
I think it is probably the latter, I think she had a whole month to talk to a few of them who even bothered reaching out to her and all of them came to the same conclusion, to drop her.
The budget she has set aside to renovate her apartment is just not realistic, it would be the same as me walking into an LV Store with $500 to purchase a limited edition $8000 bag. The amount I brought with me isn't low and I can probably get something from the store, but it is not the limited edition bag and it is the same with this particular customer, she has enough budget to do a small renovation, but not enough to do the renovation she wants to do.
I do not like reaching out to customers like her who have such unrealistic budgets because I feel that to them, the amount that they have decided to set aside is already considered, to themselves, "realistic", and asking them to increase their budget any higher than what they have decided to spend would be ridiculous, if they added more to their budget, they would expect better materials, higher level of service and higher level of just everything because to them, they are "paying more", so they "expect more", I can offer them a very competitive price for the works they have requested at the expense of my commission, but in their head, my reduced commission means nothing to them, they will still expect more even if I do them the favor of earning less on my end and I am simply not that generous of an individual to want to work with potential ingrates.
I really do not get clients like this. We are not going to take projects that will cause us to make a loss! Simple as that, it is not about our willingness to earn less, it is about the fact that we won't NOT ONLY be earning nothing, we will literally be losing money if we take on projects like theirs.
Anyways, since the client emailed me, I decided to email back and asked her to tell me exactly what she wanted to renovate, I also of course told her that her budget was not viable at all, that if she wanted to proceed, she should reconsider her budget and then also just slap my company's renovation package in the email so she can actually see how much a renovation of her magnitude would cost. The company's renovation package barely covers the basic stuff and it has already overshot her budget by 50%, and I think it is very safe to assume her requirements will be more than what the package covers.
Well, I hope she gets me message and don't message me back.
This is the kind of leads the company has been providing me, quantity over quality.
My company has been giving me a relatively steady steam of customer leads, but I will say 90% of them are pretty much a waste of time, they are either unresponsive when reached out or they have a budget that is comically low, this particular client who reached out to me today belongs to the latter.
Back when the office gave me her enquiry, the renovation requirements didn't really state much, it had the basic information attached to the email, which is the type of apartment the client had and the budget, when I saw those 2 information and how much they did not tally together, I just immediately labelled it as a waste of time and didn't bother reaching out.
Normally our leads are distributed to us by renovation portals. When a customer reaches out to a renovation portal, their enquiry will get disseminated to an average of about 5 to 6 random interior design firms that matches their requirements, which is basically "budget conscious" or "willing to pay for design", no prize for guessing which category my company falls under. Anyways, I figured if 1 out of the 5 to 6 interior design firms didn't reach out to her, she probably wouldn't even notice, so I dropped her as a potential customer lead the moment I got my hands on her requirements.
Well, she reached out today and I was honestly surprised because it has already been a month since I got her information and there was no prior contact from my end to her, so the only possibility could be that she either really wants to engage my company for her renovation services or she has spoken to all the other interior design firms and they have turned her down because of her unrealistic budget.
I think it is probably the latter, I think she had a whole month to talk to a few of them who even bothered reaching out to her and all of them came to the same conclusion, to drop her.
The budget she has set aside to renovate her apartment is just not realistic, it would be the same as me walking into an LV Store with $500 to purchase a limited edition $8000 bag. The amount I brought with me isn't low and I can probably get something from the store, but it is not the limited edition bag and it is the same with this particular customer, she has enough budget to do a small renovation, but not enough to do the renovation she wants to do.
I do not like reaching out to customers like her who have such unrealistic budgets because I feel that to them, the amount that they have decided to set aside is already considered, to themselves, "realistic", and asking them to increase their budget any higher than what they have decided to spend would be ridiculous, if they added more to their budget, they would expect better materials, higher level of service and higher level of just everything because to them, they are "paying more", so they "expect more", I can offer them a very competitive price for the works they have requested at the expense of my commission, but in their head, my reduced commission means nothing to them, they will still expect more even if I do them the favor of earning less on my end and I am simply not that generous of an individual to want to work with potential ingrates.
I really do not get clients like this. We are not going to take projects that will cause us to make a loss! Simple as that, it is not about our willingness to earn less, it is about the fact that we won't NOT ONLY be earning nothing, we will literally be losing money if we take on projects like theirs.
Anyways, since the client emailed me, I decided to email back and asked her to tell me exactly what she wanted to renovate, I also of course told her that her budget was not viable at all, that if she wanted to proceed, she should reconsider her budget and then also just slap my company's renovation package in the email so she can actually see how much a renovation of her magnitude would cost. The company's renovation package barely covers the basic stuff and it has already overshot her budget by 50%, and I think it is very safe to assume her requirements will be more than what the package covers.
Well, I hope she gets me message and don't message me back.
This is the kind of leads the company has been providing me, quantity over quality.
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