Should I Be Insulted?

[Rugby]

My partner has a good quality pin-stripped tailsuit in excellent condition for sale and is asking $500 for it. A man we know was interested in the suit so we held off selling it and when the man tried it on finally my partner, instead of asking for the money up front, told the man to take the suit to his tailor first and make sure he was happy with it before paying for it. About a month later we have now heard from the man and he told us that his tailor would alter the tails and pants for $100.00. Except for shortening the pants and sleeves and bringing in the back a bit the outfit fits him very well. It actually fits him way better than it ever did my partner. I told him that our tailor, who know the suit, was way cheaper and to go to him.
Okay, here is my problem. The man told me that he and his wife looked around and said they could get a new tailsuit for $80 so wondered if my partner would take $400. After I controlled myself from spitting out my coffee onto my white carpet I proceeded to tell him that my dad got one of "these suits" and they were, if the same, tailsuits from wedding rental places and that there was A) no comparrison in quality and structure, and B) the holes for the sleeves are cut much higher in ballroom tailsuits so, as my dad found out, you get a nice bulge of material where they added the extra material in. The sleeves are also set on differently at the seam but then I thought oh well, let them find out themselves I guess if they are looking to be cheap.
My question to everyone is, should I be insulted and should I tell my partner what the man said? Its like we were "lucky" we were even being offered $400.00 when he could get one for $80. My partner's new suit was well over $2500.00 and we found nothing under $1000 of any type of quality and all were from far away. Now I have to remember that these people are new into dancing and have no idea of the realities, kind of like out of the mouth of babes, but still. My partner was nice enough to hold off advertising the suit for quite a long time though I wanted to regardless, while we waited for his decision, but he knows how hard it is to get a good suit, or even a suit for that matter, and wanted to help the guy out. This is also why he held off taking the money, to make sure the suit worked for him. Of course this has put us well into the competition season when we could have advertised it toward the start. A friend laughed when I told him as he knows the man too and said that it was an insult and I should say bring the suit back as it was no longer for sale, I know my partner will also be insulted and I doubt he will try and help this guy again with anything. I told the fellow that he should bring the suit back this weekend but he said he wanted to talk to his wife first.
So, what does everyone think?

[and123]

I don't know if I'd feel insulted, since it sounds as if they're too new to realize how much quality ballroom clothing costs. However, having been the victim multiple times of people saying they wanted a costume from me and "please don't advertise/sell it to someone else", only to have them change their mind and back out :rolleyes:, I say whoever comes up with the cash first gets it. Unless they are a close friend you know you can trust to follow through, treat it as a business transaction. Just my personal experience....

[waltzgirl]

If they are new, they may have no idea even that dance suits are cut differently. I wouldn't be insulted, but I'd agree it's best to treating selling it as a business deal (that's what the other guy is doing--trying to get a better price).

[Joe]

I would stick to my guns and tell the dude to go ahead and get his $80 street tails and see how they perform. :)

[fascination]

ditto joe...

[lcdancesport]

I wouldn't be insulted, it's just the art of the deal. I've posted stuff on Craigslist numerous times and people would email me asking for HALF of what I'm looking for. I just laugh about it and say there's no way I could accept that offer. Sounds like he just wants to pay $500 for the suit, and asked for $400 with the tailoring being $100.

Just say you're firm at $500 and this is a great bargain, but cannot accept anything less.

[skwiggy]

No reason to be insulted. He's just trying to negotiate. Tell him the price is firm, and if he doesn't accept the price then you can sell it to someone who will.

[meow]

It seems to me that he has no idea how different dancewear is to street wear, as in style, cut and price. He should pay what you asked and agreed to or go somewhere else. He will have to learn the hard way, I think.

[Rugby]

What I should have mentioned was that a friend of mine was trying to sell 3 competition dresses and 3 evening dresses for the family of his recently deceased partner. The wife of the fellow I spoke of above offered my friend $50 for all 6 dresses. Not $50 each but for all. This couple are quite well off so I don't understand the cheap attitude. My friend phoned my up to tell me about it as he was very hurt and surprised at this ladies offer and insensitivity in making such an offer. I told him not to tell the family but tell her that he would rather burn or cut them up for rags then take an offer that was such an insult. Theres that word again. Of course he did not sell the dresses to her but sold them to others, but it already put in my mind the idea that this couple was trying to get off on the cheap yet again.

[catsmeow]

Just how much do quality ballroom outfits cost anyway
Even buying a low end suit for social wear is a couple hundred dollars in canadian funds.
Surely a well made custom fitted dance tailsuit must be in the thousands.
Let that guy eat cake Rugby

[waltzgirl]

This couple are quite well off so I don't understand the cheap attitude.


You'd be surprised at how often the two go together.

Sounds like this is their usual MO. I'd simply tell them the suit is no longer available and don't deal with them again.

[Rugby]

**Update**
I decided that I should be honest and tell my partner of the situation and he was not the happiest. He decided that he would not sell the suit to this fellow even for $500.

Today I phoned the fellow up and told him that if he could get a brand new ballroom suit made for $80 we thought that was the better way for him to go. We did not want him to feel he was overpaying for an outfit by paying $500 when he could pay $80, and if he could please return the suit as we still had another fellow who was interested. The fellow told me he and his wife were still trying to decide on if they wanted to buy it or not. After nearly a month? I asked him why he would want to pay the $500 when he told me he could get one for $80 that would be made for him. It didn't make sense for him to do so I told him that we could not sell him a pair of tails that he would feel he paid too much for. He mentioned that he realized that getting one fitted may be more hassle than it is worth. I told him for $80 it should not be that much of a hassle compared to what he was going to save, as he still had to have our suit altered, and that alone would cost more than what he would pay for having a new one made. No, he would be much happeir with the $80 suit. He had told me that he had learned alot about ballroom tails the last month or so but I gave him some advice on fitting and what to watch for anyway for when he got his made. I must say that I was surprised that if he knew so much than why would he not know the deal he was getting with my partner's suit, and what he could expect for an $80 one. Geez, my partner paid more than that for a pair of practice pants. Anyway, we will get the suit back this weekend and I'm afraid he will come to realize if he has not already, that he just passed up a huge opportunity by looking a gift horse in the mouth.
So, what to say if he phones and says he wants it for sure. What would you do?

[fascination]

if he was willing to pay the price that I wanted, i would get over myself and sell it...expensive stuff is hard to sell...it has taken me two years to get a halfway decent price on two of my more expensive gowns...I took payments in both cases...and they both still got an excellent deal....

[and123]

I say get the suit back, and he can have it as soon as he forks over $500. None of this waffling back and forth. Get it back in your possession quickly. I recently rented a gown to someone who ended up keeping it for a *month* before sending it back, and I lost another rental on it because of that delay :twisted:. Put the deal in writing.

[elisedance]

Rugby: Reading through this thread I think he's jerking you around - I would not be insulted but I would be angry. I would tell him to please return the suit immediately and he can continue to consider the purchase without it. How can you be sure he is not currently using it?

Once it is back you can let the issue sit for a while and regain your equilibrium - decide whether you want to make the sale or not. It sounds to me as if the buyer has succeeded in taking the sale decision process away from seller.

[Joe]

You and your partner are taking this way too personally.

It's not personal. It's business.

Get over the perceived "insult" and start using some business sense when dealing with this dude.

Business is business. Action is action.

[elisedance]

yes Joe, but step one is to get the suit back. Currently the buyer holds all the cards...

[skwiggy]

Absolutely get the suit back. Right now he has no reason to buy it, because he already has it.

[tangotime]

.


. This couple are quite well off so I don't understand the cheap attitude.






Thats why they are well off !!! :rolleyes:

[Joe]

Business sense includes getting the suit back. You can't sell it to anyone else if you don't have it.

[Peaches]

yes Joe, but step one is to get the suit back. Currently the buyer holds all the cards...
Yes, getting the suit back should be the first step. But that doesn't mitigate the fact that the sellers are taking it too personally.

Asking price, counter-offer...the ball is in the seller's court. Either accept it or don't...either way, move on. It's not that big of a deal. A counter-offer isn't an insult...it's a counter-offer.

[fascination]

Business sense includes getting the suit back. You can't sell it to anyone else if you don't have it.
yes...but if they have the cash after returning the suit...take it

[catsmeow]

Seems to me that the asking price is a bit on the low side especially if the suit is well made and looks good on the man. His reaction of low balling your offer smacks of
"insulting" only if the buyer is knowledgable. Perhaps the buyer is green to the current prices of ballroom tail suits and thinks he can purchase much like a used car. There are very few quality used suits on the market. You are being more than fair and he is just stupid.

[Rugby]

**Update**
It was not so much that the fellow made a counter offer, this is expected, but since we knew them we gave them our bottom price from the get go rather than go through the back and forth. We were very upfront and honest and what the insult was was the way the fellow had presented the offer to me. I made millions of dollars in sales for one of N. America's largest corporations so its not like I am new to buying and selling, far from. But, it is how you make the offer that makes the difference. If the tone is that they can get a suit for $80 so we must be trying to cheat them by asking $500 is brought across, then this is implying that the seller is attempting to rip them off. This is not business. Business is when you say a price and the person gives a counter offer and it is accepted or rejected. The seller is not made to feel like they are being dishonest in asking such a price. If you were selling a vintage Corvette would you feel insulted if the buyer turned around and said they could buy a Pinto for much cheaper so why should I think that I should sell my Corvette for a much higher price? They are both old cars so should the price not be lower for the Corvette to reflect that. Tell me that you would not take this personally? I would assume this person either new nothing about vehicles and should have educated themselves before making an offer, or that they were looking for a way to make me feel that I was asking too much to get me to lower the price so I did not feel like a cheat.
I told my partner that since these people were quite agreeable to the price before then somebody was influencing them and of this I was sure. Why the change in attitude and taking so long to give an answer.
Today I was told by a friend that the fellow was trying to get a hold of me before the thursday night give the suit back cut off. I phoned the fellow and he did say that he was sorry that he came across so poorly and he knew that how he had put the offer had not come across well. He had been told by his dance teachers that they should only offer us $350 and we would take it.
The instructors they have used to be ours and they were not thrilled that we left them after a few years and there is now some hard feelings toward us. We had no choice as they could not take us any further and the judges were telling us that we really had to make a change or get used to struggling. We stayed a year longer than we wanted to as we felt bad about leaving them. Just after we did we were at competiton where the lady instructor was one of the judges. All the big name judges gave us first or second but she gave us last in the finals causing us to lose a scholarship by one or two points. If that was her opinion then that was fine with us. Oddly enough this year another couple who were with them and also switched to our present instructors had the same thing happen to them by her. They were peeved but I said that we and they could not prove that she had been bias toward any ofus and to let it go. I don't know if these instructors were telling them to give us a low price because we were the sellers or that since they have been out of the competition scene for so long they no longer know what is going on with tails prices and availability. I mentioned that he had been given some very bad advice, as we had by them other times, and it almost cost them getting some really nice tails. I asked him what their backup plan was for him if we said no. Tails around here are almost impossible to get and you have to order from England, Russia, Montreal or the U.S. to get one and outside of England the quality is a hit or miss with the cheapest price over $1000 for the lower quality ones. Were they going to help him get a pair of cheaper tails or offset the cost of new ones if they lost out on these? No, they would not give a darn as long as it did not effect them. These teachers are not really that respected and I can see why. Anyway, we decided to sell him the suit after the misunderstanding was cleared up to let bygones be bygones.
My last note was that they should not take their advice on anything with checking into it themselves. They too are at the point where they need to move on from this couple as they are stuck at the bottom and their problems are not being addressed, but that is up to them to make that decision. I just hope they don't waste a year making it.

[Joe]

Look, the value of an item (especially used) is whatever someone is willing to pay, mitigated by how long the seller of the item is willing to wait to find someone willing to pay that value. You give your Corvette/Pinto example above, surely you must cognizant of this. If you don't want to sell the suit to these people for 350 bones, there's nothing stopping you from not selling it. You may wait a long time to get your 5 bills--in fact you may never get it. It depends how well you market your item.

[fascination]

lol...I am ready to burn the suit or buy it myself...okay just kidding...anyhow, prolly repeating myself...there is too much extraneous ruminating over this IMO...ya sell it or ya don't...personal feelings usually get in the way of good business...so I would discard them