Life is pain (…) Anyone who says differently is selling something.
-The Princess Bride

[17:24] Ryan: we attack tomorrow
[17:24] Chris: yes… tomorrow
[17:24] Ryan: …and this time I mean it
[17:24] Chris: I do too!

One of my favorite conversations in nba announcer history:

(JVG = Jeff Van Gundy)

Mark Jackson: AI could be, pound for pound, the best player in NBA history.
JVG: Are you nuts? He’s not the best player in NBA history.
Jackson: I said pound for pound.
JVG: I heard you. You said he’s the best player in NBA history.
Jackson: No, I said pound for pound.
JVG: What does that even mean?
Jackson: Sugar Ray Leonard wasn’t a heavy weight and wouldn’t have beat Ali, but he was considered the best fighter ever.
JVG: I bet I sound like an idiot because I don’t understand what you’re talking about.
Jackson: I bet you think I’m an idiot too.
Mike Breen: I’m surrounded by idiots.

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I get bored easily and begin talking to myself.

[13:32] ryankane: I want to see a pic
[13:32] ryankane: of your chick
[13:32] ryankane: get on it quick
[13:33] ryankane: f-ing prick
[13:33] ryankane: suck my d***
[13:33] ryankane: this is good schtick
[13:33] ryankane: give her a lick
[13:33] ryankane: find a stick
[13:34] ryankane: light it with a bic
[13:34] ryankane: you’re such a hick
[13:34] ryankane: I feel sick
[13:35] ryankane: the clock goes toc-tic
[13:35] ryankane: (it’s a dyslexic clock)
[13:35] ryankane: I’ll send your dog to michael vick
[13:35] ryankane: find a candle, get some wick
[13:36] ryankane: I should become a famous white rapper only to have my popularity wane over the years as my white-trash background comes back to haunt me
[13:36] ryankane: oh wait, that’s already been done before

I’ve been meaning to write a book about this for awhile now. As I’ve put it off for probably 10 years now, I can safely assume that it will be a long time before I touch on the subject at length anyway, so why not talk about it in short right now?

“Never pay retail”. Sounds somewhat overzealous of me to suggest something like that, doesn’t it? I mean- do I expect you to go out to the supermarket and haggle over the price of a gallon of milk? No, no I do not. However, for the most part, you CAN get things cheaper than you pay for them. A LOT cheaper.

The old adage, “It’s not WHAT you know; it’s WHO you know” has never been more appropriately applied to a real-world concept. It’s not enough to just KNOW someone, however. You have to know them well enough and manipulate their feelings towards you. You have to make them feel as if they “owe you one” or otherwise need to give you a deal.

You can see this in the short term by haggling. You make them feel as if they owe you a lower price by making it seem as if you won’t purchase the item/service if they don’t give you a break. While this is a great solution for a one-time purchase, you have undoubtedly noticed by now that we are creatures of habit, and frequently purchase goods and services from the same vendors.

Take restaurants as a prime example. Restaurants are one of the interesting places where we spent money on HUGELY marked up goods. As most restaurant owners can attest to, most of the meals on a menu are sold at around a 400% markup. Take a pizza, for example: Dough, cheese, toppings, and sauce. Cost of materials is likely under $3 for a large (maybe $5 at most). At pizza hut or dominos (no waiter/waitress involved), you’ll buy that pizza for $14 and consider that a normal price. $3 worth of food, $14 price tag. Before you cry that I’m guessing at the numbers, I would like to disclose that I used to manage a Dominos. Really.

Can you call up Dominos and haggle over the price of the pizza? No. They’ll think you’re an idiot, and wonder what the hell you think you’re doing. Why? Because you’re talking to the wrong person. The person who has power is certainly not going to answer the phone. In fact, the person who has power doesn’t even work in that store. The person you want is the owner.

Small business owners quite often fall into the same category. They were gutsy enough to risk some things by starting their own business, and they are looking to cut every corner possible. They like knowing people, and will go to great lengths to maintain customers. Study these people, as they are your key to never paying retail.

Let us focus our case study on restaurant owners for a bit. Not all fall into one stereotype, but we can safely assume that most will have at least SOME of the same qualities. Here are a few qualities of the small business restaurant owner: Not the best at managing people, scatter-brained, in love with their concept, opinionated, cheap, popular, short attention span, unorganized.

Now, as the deceiving douche-bag’s that we all are, we must look at this stereotype and figure out ways to manipulate and take advantage of this personality.

Easily the most ethical approach is the befriend them. Friends hook their friends up. Pure and simple. There’s no lying, no cheating, no worrying about getting caught- you just have to be ok with taking charity from a friend.

Trade of services is the second best way. You are not exactly taking advantage of them, but in a trade of services you have to remember that you are not always going to match up 100% on the value of traded services. Furthermore, you have to be careful not to get stuck in a situation where the value of your goods/services doesn’t increase in value such that you are getting the short end of the deal. It is difficult to renegotiate a trade of services with a friend who owns a business. Trust me, I’ve tried.

[to be continued…]

Sometimes a movie can be summed up in one quote from it.

I’m dedicating a website to this phenomenon:

www.quintessentialquotes.com

I don’t care how bad you think your day is going to be today- you’re going to have a Good Friday.

(cue cheesy “wah wah” sound)

I recently used the facilities on the first level of my office. Upstairs is the “administration” part of the staff, and downstairs is the “operations” part… you know, the people who actually get stuff done instead of just talking about it.

Now I may not be the most observant fellow out there, but I can tell when my post-bathroom pain is greater than normal. I can understand the harshness of wiping with something that is not as soft as I am used to. My hind-quarters can tell when the abrasive feel of lower-quality bargain toilet paper has graced my nether-regions with it’s presence. Yeah, I’m basically saying that my ass hurts when I use crappy toilet paper.

Why is it that the downstairs toilet paper isn’t as soft as the upstairs toilet paper? Is that one place where we truly need to mark our territory as being in superior positions requiring more responsibility and accountability? Of all the ways to keep the masses at bay… we choose to save a few pennies per roll and make them suffer when cleaning up after number two.

It’s odd that I point this out at all… I’m part of the privileged elite who gets to reap the advantages of the bottom-friendly higher-quality tissue. However, if it were up to me, we’d all go by my brand loyalty standards and use whatever brand Costco sells in bulk to get the job done.

Don’t act like you’re not a brand whore like me, either. You know full well that if Costco stopped selling charmin ultra and moved to something else, you’d be right there with the rest of us using the new product.

Note to Costco: If you change away from charmin ultra, I’ll be pissed. Fully expect me to sigh heavily, tell my shopping companion that “I can’t believe they’d switch away from charmin ultra. That stuff is the best!” Then I will quietly load the new brand into my cart and never speak of it again. So there… take that! Fear the all-powerful brand whore that is Ryan.