do you give friends or family a discount?

[Spider]

I guess you didn't read the rest of my post!

[tylerhutchinson]

I have in the past as needed, but I make sure that they do not promote their discount to others when I do offer it to them. I think it is the nice thing to do tho. I know many of my friends give me discounts on their stuff so its only fair to return the favor.

[windowwasher86]

Generally, I don't do business for friends or family. I consider it a "conflict of interest". For example, I really, really don't want to lose a friend or a family member over a job that A) they cant pay for, B) they think im greedy, and try to get something for nothing out of me.

To me there is personal, and there is business. I've helped friends and family so much and it turned out wrong that I'm staying away from that, it's not worth it.

Smart business to me atleast, is knowing when to seperate personal affairs from business affairs. I dont care what line of work youre in, thats my preffered method.

[GreaterVisibility]

No discounts here. If you're a friend or family member and want my service, it takes the same amount of time, equipment, supplies, etc. to do that job. If you choose to be a customer and want my service, then I have to treat you as such. To do otherwise can start to blur boundaries.

With that said, if a friend or family member was truly in need in some way, and I knew that they couldn't afford my services, I would just give it as a gift for free as if I was helping them in any other way that just didn't happen to be related to my businesses.

I agree with windowwasher above. There is personal, and there is business. It's important to separate the two.

[teerwater]

With family, I always do work at cost (I have a small family). Friends are different... Initially I offered deep discounts to friends thinking word of mouth would help my business, but it didn't take long to find out you had alot more "firends" than you thought. Also, friends want the "Friend Price" but they also want the "Retail Price Service". This is when I decided to give a small friend discount (10%) which is the same price I would offer as sale prices to retail customers. This has worked well for me. For new businesses, I would recommend deciding what friend/family discount's will be and sticking with it. Doing so will eliminate the "I got a better deal than you" conversation your "friends" will have!

Dan

[queenvictoria]

I give discounts to friends and relatives but I never forget to tell them that it's a secret and they are the only ones who get my products and services at discounted prices. This way, they will know somehow that the special treatment I am giving them will be taken away if they speak about this privilege to others.

[yllainehudges]

A discount should not be given regularly might as well giving discounts to your friends or family. I guess it's not a normal process in business because if you will give discounts all the time in the end you lose some. The main reason why we are doing business is to earn profit and how could you earn profit if you don't practice the right way of doing business.