Recently I was accompanying an American buyer to visit factories in Canton. It was a sort of buying trip. It seemed to me that wherever he went, he always wanted the cheapest price. When I reminded him that the price he paid is already below the factory cost. you guess what he said to me. " Do not be naive, David, I have been to China many times and I know there is no bottom of price in China." I just did not see eye to eye with him and I argued that " you are absolutely right, but at the same time, there is no bottom for quality too." Anyway, I just do not appreciate his way of doing business.
I told him a joke about cheap product--Once a guy went to Wengzhou on business( a place in China used to be famous for cheap consumer products). He knew that shoes were very cheap there. So he went to a free market to bargain with a shoe dealer. While haggling over the price, he kept pushing the price down and even tried to buy a pair of leather shoes at 20 Yuan ( about USD2.40). Since the dealer did not want to lose the business, he simply gave him a pair of fashionable shoes just for 20 Yuan. The guy was hesitated, asking about quality of the shoes and what kind of guarantee he could have. " Well," the dealer said calmly, " at least I can guarantee that one shoe can last until you get back to your hotel." This story does prove something, does not it?
Another joke about shoes suddently stuck on my mind. Once upon a time, there was a street boy who made living on polishing shoes. All his customers wanted to pay less than he derserved. Once a well dressed gentleman asked him to polish his shoes. He said " come over, buy, I give you 5 cents to polish my shoes." " OK, sir," the boy said cheerfully," I will polish a shoe for you for 5 cents." So the boy started polishing the shoe very hard and carefully until it was shining as a mirror. " Good job, well done, boy," the gentleman praised him, stretching out another foot to have another shoe polished. " Excuse me, sir, I need 3 dollars to polish this show," the boy said calmly. The gentleman was surprised and said angrily " how come, you said 5 cents." " But you did not listen to me carefully, sir," said the boy argumentatively," I said 5 cents for one shoe, not a pair of shoes.' In the end, that poor gentleman had no choice but to pay 3 dollars foranother shoe being polished because he certainly did not want to walk in the street with two different look shoes.
I believe in fair dealing. You should pay fairly for what you get. In other words, the price you pay should match the qualtiy of products or services you get. If something sounds too good to be true, it can never be true. If you do not believe me, read again the two jokes I told above. Do you still want a pair of leather of shoes at 20 Yuan?? :-)
