Jorge and I were in Pile in the home of a weaver. She had invited us to eat\u00a0our lunches at her family dining table. We\u2019d brought our lunches with us,\u00a0knowing it would be a long day and that there are no restaurants in Pile. We\u00a0bought cold drinks from her, supporting the small business she runs from her\u00a0refrigerator. Beer for me, water for Jorge. (Lunch was arroz con mariscos, rice\u00a0with seafood, from Jorge\u2019s restaurant. Warmer than expected, having been\u00a0packed four hours earlier.)<\/p>\n
She joined us at the table and we shared our lunch with her. She\u00a0complimented his cook. After we ate, I asked if she had any hats to sell.\u00a0Maybe. She showed us two hats woven by her daughter-in-law.<\/p>\n
Jorge asked the prices. She thought it over, probably calculating the\u00a0highest prices she might dare to ask. Eventually, she named her prices. Once\u00a0she had decided, she was wonderfully assertive, not at all tentative. I liked\u00a0this woman very much.<\/p>\n
Jorge nodded acknowledgement. We examined the hats.<\/p>\n
I measured the crown heights and brim widths, put them on my head to\u00a0estimate their sizes. I evaluated the weave quality and straw color throughout\u00a0each hat. I looked at them carefully in direct light and in shade. This is very\u00a0important but I won\u2019t explain why; let my competitors try to figure it\u00a0out for themselves. I used the tape measure again and counted the weave in\u00a0several places on each hat.<\/p>\n
She watched this unusual process with interest. The local dealers in Pile\u00a0typically glance at a hat quickly then attack the asking price, trying to push\u00a0it as low as possible.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t do that. I view the weavers as my teammates, not my\u00a0adversaries.<\/p>\n
We have a pricing system based on weave count, weave quality, straw color,\u00a0hat size, brim width, etc. We use the same pricing system for every hat, every\u00a0weaver, every day. We do our best to be as fair and as even-handed as possible.\u00a0There will always be an element of subjective judgment of course. And I think\u00a0that\u2019s good too. If we bend our system, we bend it in favor of the\u00a0weaver, usually to reward an especially nice weave.<\/p>\n
After studying the two hats, I conferred with Jorge. We checked my numbers\u00a0against our pricing chart.<\/p>\n
I smiled and told her we would be happy to buy her hats, but not at her\u00a0prices. She was used to that and prepared to argue her case for her prices.\u00a0Before she could start to argue I told her our offering prices, both higher\u00a0than her asking prices. She opened her mouth to contest our prices, then closed\u00a0it, a little confused.<\/p>\n
She had no experience with this kind of bargaining. To the best of her\u00a0knowledge, never in the history of fine hat weaving had a buyer offered a\u00a0higher price than the weaver had asked.<\/p>\n
She asked our prices again, to make sure she had heard them correctly. Jorge\u00a0repeated our prices. She repeated them back with a question mark at the end.\u00a0Jorge and I both nodded confirmation.<\/p>\n
She laughed. She agreed to sell at our prices, rather than hers. She asked\u00a0Jorge if I was retarded. Naturally, he said yes. Maybe I am.<\/p>\n
After everyone had a good laugh at my expense, Jorge explained our pricing\u00a0system and how it works. We gave her a tape measure and a magnifying glass.\u00a0Jorge showed her how to count the weave on her hats and her family\u2019s\u00a0hats.<\/p>\n
She and her family have been happy to sell us their hats ever since.\u00a0Win-win.<\/p>\n
Sim\u00f3n Espinal, the best weaver in the world, had a similar experience\u00a0with us. I have been buying his entire production for years, paying him double\u00a0what he used to earn, plus an artist\u2019s commission on sold hats. But he\u00a0had heard rumors of easy work and high pay in Venezuela. Yikes. Not true, but\u00a0he doesn\u2019t know that.<\/p>\n
The thought of the best weaver in the world leaving the country to chase a\u00a0false rumor was horrifying. I asked him to think about the amount of money he\u00a0would need to earn each month in order to stay home with his family and keep\u00a0weaving art.<\/p>\n
He thought it over. Thought about the rumors of easy wealth. Thought about\u00a0his family. Thought about the gringo nutcase he\u2019d been observing for a\u00a0few years. He came up with a number and politely proposed it to Jorge.<\/p>\n
Jorge said no. He made a counter-offer 40% higher than what Sim\u00f3n had\u00a0asked for.<\/p>\n
Jorge proposed his revised compensation package to me. I said no. I made a\u00a0counter-offer, adding another 20% to what Sim\u00f3n had asked for.<\/p>\n
Sim\u00f3n carefully chewed and digested this unusual bargaining process\u00a0before speaking. He consented to sell out and stay home with his family for 60%\u00a0more than his asking price. The man drives a hard bargain.<\/p>\n
Jorge and I were exhausted by the effort.<\/p>\n
As a business matter, I had decided to shift a significant part of the\u00a0artist\u2019s commission forward, thus making Sim\u00f3n the highest paid\u00a0weaver in history. Fair enough. Sim\u00f3n may be the best ever.<\/p>\n
He also receives an artist\u2019s commission from each of his masterpieces.\u00a0He earns it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Here\u2019s an example from November 2006: Jorge and I were in Pile in the home of a weaver. She had invited us to eat\u00a0our lunches at her family dining table. We\u2019d brought our lunches with us,\u00a0knowing it would be a long day and that there are no restaurants in Pile. We\u00a0bought cold drinks from her, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":63,"featured_media":987,"parent":29,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-151","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/63"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=151"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/151\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3356,"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/151\/revisions\/3356"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/29"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stage.brentblack.com\/cart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}