If you are a handmade artist, no matter what you sell, mistakes happen and there is nothing you can do about it.  Whether it is the post office losing your package, a misplaced order, a forgotten email, or just a brain spasm, if you are in business you are going to run into some problem of some sort.  Whether or not you retain a customer in any of these situations really depends on how you handle it and your attitude towards it and the customer….so let me tell you what happened to me which made me a customer for life of one darling bead artist.

As many of you know, I do an obscene number of crafts in all types of media.  While I don’t sell them all, I do love the thrill of learning a new technique and playing with new ideas if just to give away to my family and friends.  I recently went on a beading kick and ordered quite a few tutorials for various patterns to play with in my “spare time” (which I never seem to find!).  Some were instant downloads so I grabbed them and others were to be sent to me via email.  I began happily collecting all my amazing patterns and putting them to the side for the time that I had a few minutes to pull out my beads and play!

During this time, the holidays came and went and life happened and I never got those few minutes.  I also did not realize that one of the patterns I ordered never arrived in my email…until today when I got the nicest email in my inbox!

Tracey, of Crystal Star Gems was cleaning up her own email and came across my order and quickly realized that the pattern was never sent!  Now, I think we can all relate to that sinking feeling in your stomach when you realize that an order was either forgotten or gone wrong.  You wish, or at least I wish, I could crawl into a hole and close my eyes and it will all go away.  Unfortunately, this is not what happens, so your option is to leave your customer hanging with a very bad taste in their mouth or deal with it head on.

Tracey chose the latter and has earned a ton of respect from me as a customer.  She emailed me the forgotten pattern as well as a heartfelt apology and a refund.  In addition, she offered me a free pattern of my choice to make up for the forgotten order.  I declined her offer as I hadn’t had time to worry about making the pattern anyways so it was no loss to me but the idea that she would be so quick to do everything in her power to rectify the situation was wonderful and made me feel much more confident about purchasing more from her in the future.

So what have we learned?  Things happen!  Maybe you have been blessed as to not have had a single order go wrong (quick….knock on wood!) but if you stay in business for long I can almost guarantee that at some point it will.  Rather than hiding your head or trying to pass the blame, face it and your customer head on.  Apologize from the heart and find a way to fix the situation so well that your customers wish you made mistakes more often!  By doing this, your customer will feel valued and be much more willing to recommend you shop to others in the future as well as become a repeat customer.

Now, while you ponder all the things that can go wrong and the wonderful ways in which you will handle the situation…..take a few minutes to check out the amazing beadwork and tutorials (which are incredibly well written and so clear that I’m pretty sure anyone can have success with them) from Crystal Star Gems on Etsy or on her personal website!