When it comes to the goals for your growing business, thinking about developing a partnership with your local furniture vendor may not be at the top of your mind. In this blog post, we will discuss why you should consider developing this type of relationship (if you don’t already have one established) and why you should not think about getting office furniture as simply a cash transaction.

WHY A PARTNERSHIP?

In our previous blog post, we talked about the various approaches you can take when it comes to buying furniture for your growing office. In one of the sections, we discussed an office furniture partnership. This isn’t referring to the type of business firm represented by two or more partners. Rather, this type of partnership is about having a healthy and respected relationship between two or more parties. There’s an old saying about business that goes a little something like, “We’re in the business of doing business with other people.” If you’re currently in charge of your particular company or are working on business growth and development, you may be familiar with this phrase. No matter what industry you may be in, having a healthy human connection is critical for long-term business success. When you have an established relationship with someone and have had the chance to develop a strong rapport, many aspects of that relationship become easier. Think about it this way – if you’re looking for a new furniture design for your growing business, are you going to trust a pushy salesperson who you just met or someone you’ve had time to develop a relationship with? By having a healthy partnership between your business and an office furniture supplier, both parties can more easily determine what pieces are needed and how to properly execute. By knowing you (and your business) personally, having a close partnership will help ensure you are getting the best results (and treatment) possible for your business.

It’s Not Just a Cash Transaction

Think about the last time you went to a store to make a purchase. It could be a simple as buying groceries, or it could be that time you went and purchased a 4K television. What do these instances have in common? The cashier at the grocery store and the salesperson at the electronic store treated these instances as simple cash transactions, because that’s all they were. There isn’t anything wrong with this method of making a purchase for certain occasions. It’s safe to assume that both the cashier and salesperson were nice people, but they most likely didn’t know you on a personal level. This is where having a partnership with another company comes into play. Because this isn’t simply a transactional experience, when you start developing your partnership with a local furniture vendor, it should be about getting to know you on a personal level. That particular furniture company should understand your wants, needs and desires way before a sale is recommended. These sales conversations shouldn’t revolve around why “Product A is better for you than Product B because…”. It isn’t just about finding the right physical product and calling it a day. When you have this partnership in place, it’ll be much easier for a full solution to be recommended. After all, isn’t finding the right solution for your business needs the real reason you wanted to form this partnership?

Closing Thoughts

With a new year comes new resolutions to be had. It isn’t going to be every day that your company is going to need to acquire new furniture for the office. However, when that time comes, you’re going to want to have the peace of mind knowing that you have a partnership in place to make this easier. You are the expert at your particular business. An office furniture supplier is full of experts who are there to help business bring their spaces to life in a way others cannot achieve. By spending the time to create this partnership, you’re able to do business successfully with another human being, and it won’t just be a cash transaction. Hopefully this information was useful to you and your business. If you have any questions or would like to chat, feel free to reach out to us at sara@midcityoffice.com to get the conversation started. We’d love to hear from you soon 🙂