Lund Tuner calling a customer a Re*****?

[K4fxd]

We just turned down a customer trying to buy an RV for over 100k.

Must be nice to be able to turn down that commission or profit.

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[Evolvd]

Must be nice to be able to turn down that commission or profit.

“Must be nice” is the typically the response of those who lack integrity or willpower to work for something. Some business deals just aren’t worth the headache. My wife and I have turned down clients based on initial interactions for this exact reason. Sanity is worth more than income.

 

[K4fxd]

Sanity is worth more than income.

I never had that luxury. I either had a Boss to answer to, or a payment and payroll due.

 

[Evolvd]

I never had that luxury. I either had a Boss to answer to, or a payment and payroll due.

That’s always the rub, and it takes a metric shit ton of discipline to get yourself to the point of being able to say “no” and still make the bottom line.

 

[TeeLew]

Must be nice to be able to turn down that commission or profit.

Sometimes it's the only play and you have to take it. It nearly never works out.

 

[1TUFF_S550]

lol they’re not the only ones stealing tunes..i remember originally there was only a hand full of coyote tuners when
they came out. Now everybody with a sucked off tune is a tuner.

lol a bunch of whiny ass crybabies around here.


And customers can remember their tuner is taking their tune from Lund. Remember that.

 

[Angrey]

lol they’re not the only ones stealing tunes..i remember originally there was only a hand full of coyote tuners when
they came out. Now everybody with a sucked off tune is a tuner.

There's been multiple threads about this subject and pages of comments.

Firstly, there's no intellectual capital in tuning, especially when virtually ALL tuners are stealing someone else's work and design from the get go (aka Ford Motor Company).

Secondly, if you have a recipe for Ribs and I take your recipe and tweak it, add a couple of things, do something slightly different, omit something, it's no longer your recipe, it's my recipe now.

Thirdly, there's a healthy balance in respecting that A) Tuning has particular aspects that it helps to have someone who has experience and familiarity and B) Tuning isn't quantum physics. It's not solving the mysteries of the universe and doesn't take a PhD. Too many people act like tuning is some sorta mystery science that only tuners can understand.

It'd be different if each and every tuner was crafting their own calibration, with their own custom inputs and outputs, algorithms and calculations, etc. They're not. They're all ripping off Ford's work and modifying it to fit the customer's particular configuration.

There are some extremely smart and talented members in their forum who can and do things within the Ford OE tuning platform that most of the "common" names in tuning either can't or won't. Much of the time, "tuners" get complacent and lazy and about efficiencies in making money. Many of them are resistant to trying new or better approaches.

We need more and new tuners in the game. It makes the whole process eventually better and expands the capabilities and knowledge. I hate this idea that "you're not a tuner" so you should just STFU and accept what your tuner is telling you. Tuners aren't God. They're not even authorities but many people tend to worship or hold them in spectacle like they're the only ones who can grapple life's mysteries of an engine calibration.

 

[beefcake]

This says it all right here.

I would have sent my best calibrator to your test day and fixed the car.

It’s funny that you say that I was at FL 2K like right after it all went down

And I remember Sharad from Upr coming up to me. And he was just mind blown. he said if you were having that kind of trouble with your car as quick as it is with our suspension on it and it was a suspension issue. He said I guarantee you joe would have me on a plane at the track with you figuring out what was going on.

The fact that you had sent over $1 million and they just wrote you off is unbelievable

And that was the consensus from even competing tuners

“Must be nice” is the typically the response of those who lack integrity or willpower to work for something. Some business deals just aren’t worth the headache. My wife and I have turned down clients based on initial interactions for this exact reason. Sanity is worth more than income.

Well, as someone who was very successful in the car business for 14 years, you probably will agree with the statement. The people that you make the most money off of are the happiest and the people that nick and dime you for six hours to put a deal together are the ones who always call you complaining and upset and just never seem to go away.

the ones you make money on you never hear from

A good deal is a state of mind. If you get something you’re happy with it. You enjoy it. You’re gonna be happy.

It’s the same thing in the Parts business though we go out of our way to take care of customers and especially group members. We take care of them we always always discount. We always help the guys out.

But you do get one every now and then I just had a guy yesterday ordering $69 wanting to know how much we could do on discounts. What kind of coupons how could he avoid paying the $12 shipping?

I had short messages from him on a $69 part.

I apologize and explained we’re making like three dollars and it was nothing we could do

 

[Evolvd]

It’s funny that you say that I was at FL 2K like right after it all went down

And I remember Sharad from Upr coming up to me. And he was just mind blown. he said if you were having that kind of trouble with your car as quick as it is with our suspension on it and it was a suspension issue. He said I guarantee you joe would have me on a plane at the track with you figuring out what was going on.

The fact that you had sent over $1 million and they just wrote you off is unbelievable

And that was the consensus from even competing tuners



Well, as someone who was very successful in the car business for 14 years, you probably will agree with the statement. The people that you make the most money off of are the happiest and the people that nick and dime you for six hours to put a deal together are the ones who always call you complaining and upset and just never seem to go away.

the ones you make money on you never hear from

A good deal is a state of mind. If you get something you’re happy with it. You enjoy it. You’re gonna be happy.

It’s the same thing in the Parts business though we go out of our way to take care of customers and especially group members. We take care of them we always always discount. We always help the guys out.

But you do get one every now and then I just had a guy yesterday ordering $69 wanting to know how much we could do on discounts. What kind of coupons how could he avoid paying the $12 shipping?

I had short messages from him on a $69 part.

I apologize and explained we’re making like three dollars and it was nothing we could do

Those types of people are ones who’ve never run a business and have no clue what is involved.
Someone saying “must be nice” is either unwilling to work harder to achieve that goal or is ignorant of how much work someone else did put in to get to that point.
And I couldn’t agree more on your definition of a “good deal”. As a customer, offering a 10% discount is not as good of a deal as supporting me before and after the sale. A lot of folks don’t think past the end of their noses to get that.

 

[Trap]

If the car business is bad, I can't imagine how awful the RV business is.

The RV business is not great right now, but that customer went beyond worth having. Some customers are better left for your competition to deal with

 

[robvas]

It'd be different if each and every tuner was crafting their own calibration, with their own custom inputs and outputs, algorithms and calculations, etc. They're not. They're all ripping off Ford's work and modifying it to fit the customer's particular configuration.

This a stupid argument, becuase this could apply to basically every aftermarket part there is. "You're just putting a new air intake on a motor Ford designed and ripping off their work...", "Your custom cams are just using the same blanks Ford uses..."

 

[HKusp]

The RV business is not great right now, but that customer went beyond worth having. Some customers are better left for your competition to deal with

Addition by subtraction. Those customers will drain you of the profits by tying up your staff for hours. All of that costs money. Let someone else deal with them. Let them be mentally and physically fatigued by them. You don't have to make every deal. Sometimes the best deals are the ones that weren't made.

 

[robvas]

The fact that you had sent over $1 million and they just wrote you off is unbelievable

I don't expect you to answer this, but where are you sending the $1m in business to now? (and was this per year, or over x period of time...)

Is it all going to the tuners that you still work with? Are more customers just getting tuning on their own now? (whether it be Lund or tuner x,y,z?)

I'm just wondering if on their end, they just said something like:

1. Fuck it, Beefcake will miss getting his cut more than we miss the customers
2. A certain amount of Beefcake's customers were a PITA not not worth it (for whatever reason)
3. The majority of those customers will still come to us anyway

I'm just thinking outloud, I've ordered parts from you before and always been happy with the service.

 

[HKusp]

This a stupid argument, becuase this could apply to basically every aftermarket part there is. "You're just putting a new air intake on a motor Ford designed and ripping off their work...", "Your custom cams are just using the same blanks Ford uses..."

So your argument is the first guy to rip off Ford is the one who has intellectual property rights to Fords work, and all the others are just whiners who are ripping off the first guy to bring it to market. Am I tracking this right?

 

[K4fxd]

I apologize and explained we’re making like three dollars and it was nothing we could do

A lot of times this kind of response takes care of the problem. I always want the best deal I can get, I also know the guy in business has to make something or he won't be in business long.

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