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In the last two installments of Business Tips for Designers and Decorators, we've discussed how to present the preliminary budget and how to handle the client's reaction to the budget. If you haven't read those installments, please do so before you read this month's installment.
As we covered in the last installment of this series, often clients may react with surprise to a total budget figure, but after you review each item with them, they will agree that every item is necessary and that the budget is indeed accurate and fair. But there are situations where the client simply cannot afford the room for which you've prepared a budget. What to do?
Reducing the Budget
If you have to adjust the budget downward because they simply cannot afford it, of course you will do so. Schedule another meeting at which you will present them with a revised plane with a revised budget. In preparing your revised plan and budget, it is important that you realize some very important aspects of your responsibility to the clients, as follows:
- Tip: Whatever your client's budget, your responsibility as an interior designer is to make certain that every job you complete is a quality job in which you can take pride and the client finds completely satisfactory. If you can't undertake a project and produce a first-class job, then don't touch the project because you will be judged by the highest standard regardless of the budget.
Don't use rayon upholstery because it's "almost as good as silk," or a viscose rug because it "almost looks like wool." If the clients have built a tacky little bookshelf, for example, that's all right for them. But when you, the interior designer, purchase or design a bookshelf, it had better be perfect. No matter whether the client has paid fifty dollars or fifty thousand dollars, if you do a job as an interior designer, it has to be done right. You can't attach your name to inferior materials or second-rate workmanship.
It's your responsibility to do this. Your clients are undertaking a process that is probably unfamiliar to them. You're the professional and this is your field. Hence, it is your job to make certain nothing has been left out. Once the budget is agreed upon, there should be no further monetary surprises for the clients. Yes, there will inevitably be some delays. There may even be some added costs that neither you nor they could anticipate. But, within the framework of what you should have foreseen and could have foreseen, there should be no surprises.
For this reason, you cannot afford to take jobs with ridiculously low budgets because you'll end up with terrible examples of your work that will come back to haunt you. There's an old saying: "Doctors bury their mistakes; architects grow vines." You can't do either. Your mistakes will be left exposed, naked for everyone to see. And you will be judged by them.
Guard Your Reputation
Remember this whenever a close friend or relative implores you to work miracles with a bunch of cheap materials and a non-existent budget. Even though you are working free and doing someone a favor, you will be judged by the result just as if the budget had been unlimited. Just as a surgeon can't perform a "cheapie" operation on a friend, you can't afford the damage to your reputation of doing a cheapie interior design as a favor.
Similarly, if clients talk you into this folly, just wait until you try to deliver the bargain. The sky will fall in. The clients will belabor you about faults in the finish or the design, and suddenly the same clients won't hear you when you begin to explain: "But remember, we agreed that this was supposed to be a bargain?"
An Alternative Approach
What do you do if the clients can only afford a budget that is not sufficient for a first-rate job for the entire project?
Consider stretching the job over a longer period. For example, suggest that you take care of the essentials now, and leave the other aspects of the job to next year when they may be able to afford the additional expenditures. Assure them that your objective is to provide them with a quality environment in which they will live with pride for years to come. Rather than skimp on quality, which you cannot do, you recommend that they give the job more time so that it gets done right, although over a period of time.
Of course, in revising the plan and the budget you may also suggest less-expensive pieces of furniture and less-costly materials, provided they meet all the guidelines you have established, including suitability of quality.
You may be able to specify perfectly appropriate, less-costly items within the revised budget. When you do, however, be sure that what you specify is a top-quality version of the less-costly item. For example, cocoa matting is probably the least expensive material you can buy to cover floors in today's world. On a low-budget job, you may decide that cocoa matting can handle the job quite appropriately. If so, be sure to specify top-quality cocoa matting, and make sure that it is properly installed. You must apply the same standard of quality to the cocoa matting that you would apply to custom-made wool carpeting.
By revising your budget in this manner, you may be able to satisfy the financial limitations of the clients at the same time that you assure a top-quality job.
Working with Clients
Once your plan has been presented, it's often best to include in all discussions the words "we" and "our": "After we get our plans finalized," "After we get our budget set," and so on.
This freely-taken intimacy provides the basis for a positive client-designer relationship that is permeated with warmth and trust. You're both in this together, and you both have a personal stake in the outcome of this mutual investment. You are investing your time, talent, and reputation. They are investing their money.
You want to show your commitment to them. Obviously, you're not going to live in the house, but you are going to take full and proud responsibility for the finished job. It's going to represent your abilities as a designer, and that's something that you don't take lightly. So, a subliminal way for you to express your commitment to the project is to use the terms "we" and "our" when referring to it. This sets the stage for the close client-designer relationship you want to establish.
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