I think you hit the nail on the head. When your talking about a business relationship that has a $10,000 vested interest...you need to find ways to make the marriage work. Perhaps not on that particular item...or adjust that item, and make it up on something else to keep it all working. Sometimes you need to do a balancing act because your customers perception is reality....Do what you need to keep him happy, while balancing it out to keep yourself in a place you need to be for profits.

Unfortunately there are times you have customers that whittle you down across the board....those are the hard decisions on if to let go or not......

This subject is a difficult one....There are so many angles to take into consideration. I feel as if both sides of the issue have many good logical points. The main goal is to be profitable. if you can't be profitable in some way...it's time to be looking for different kinds of business than what your marketing, or changing the efficiency in which you do the work. sometimes these problems require taking less for one job, and shuffling the price on the other end somewhere where it's not perceived as gouging.

Good luck....sounds like you have solid sales, and a decent enough relationship with this customer to find common ground somewhere along the way.

Woman goes into a butcher shop for a chicken. Butcher tells her it's $10.00. Woman tells the butcher that she can get it for $5.75 at another butcher shop. Butcher tells her to buy it there then. Woman says she can't, the other butcher went out of business. Butcher tells her that if he were out of business, he'd sell her the chicken for $5.75 too.

Point being, keep so busy for so little and eventually you're out of business.

Don't be afraid to charge for a quality product.

Have a great weekend, all.

Steve

Bump the low ball bid up by $.50 and if you get the order, sub it out to the lowballer.

Dave