the bermuda triangle for makers ....

You may or may not have ever seen the triangle of customer expectations and it may or may not have ever actually been called this, but I think it is kind of catchy and one of those 'made to stick' phrases you will be talking about at the dinner table tonight

or maybe save it for when you are trying to get your kids to sleep- it might work better then.

(in case you haven't seen it or thought about how it might relate to your maker business, I have updated it for us here to be a little more memorable - in a marching band, geeky kind of way)

This is what your customer wants. They want it fast, they want it great and they want it cheap. And this is exactly what you cannot give them if you want to stay in business.

They can have 2 out of 3 and in fact you probably have to provide 2 out of 3, but provide all 3 and you will be doomed.

*cue the dramatic music*

(yes, doomed - this may sound a little melodramatic, but you will not last long providing excellent, fast and cheap makings, trust me)

So you can make 'em good and cheap, but not fast

or good and fast but not cheap

or fast and cheap but not good ... you get the idea.

I remember this chart from my days at a 'real job'. They handed it out on an orange 'slow moving vehicle' triangle that is for some reason burned into my brain.

(yes, the same brain that cannot remember if I fed the dog or where I put my keys or if I bought my hubby an anniversary card ... seriously what the hell happened to that card? and I have to keep this guy happy or we will have no one to cook for us or kill the stinkbugs)

So, I will leave everyone to ponder over the triangle's wisdom - keeping it short and sweet this week after last week's mini-rant against shop local got me quite a few emails from unhappy campers thinking I had misunderstood the concept - you would think I had ranted against babies and kittens for pete's sake - which I am planning to rant against next week actually ... especially those damn kittens ....