Supermarket Checkouts and 3D modelling

I walked into a printery the other day to pick up some plans and had one of those ‘Aha’ moments.

The owner of the business asked me if I would like to have some 3D visualisation work done for any of my clients, before we get to the ‘technical CAD stage.’ Or that they could do the design in 3D and we could turn this into a draughted CAD file with plans for them.I was most interested, this is what I do for a living after all; using SketchUp Pro for 3D modelling and AutoCAD for www.structuralintegrity.co.nz

Sure enough, one of the staff members was working on a joinery item for a local interior designer and not making a bad hash of it. SketchUp is the best modelling software out there for creative types, and it’s not only a joy to use, it’s free! In fact you can download it here:

http://sketchup.google.com/download/

We had offered our services to this designer some time ago and were a little disappointed that we did not get a chance to price the job as we like their work. Our rate for working for a lead designer would have been $70/hour plus GST. However the designer could not justify the cost to the client, so was using an enthusiastic amateur at the printery for $55/hour plus GST.

Please remember that ‘amateur’ in French means someone who does something for the love of it, often at personal sacrifice. The All Blacks and the world rugby players used to be true amateurs, now they just have a job in an 80 minute reality TV show. In this case, it is someone who is doing what they enjoy as an interest, but are asking to be paid as a professional.

And the $15 an hour difference is this:

We are professionals offering advice, and have Professional Indemnity Insurance to safeguard our clients from 1 million dollars worth of our own stupidity. This costs over 3 grand a year and I would be surprised if the printery even knew about this insurance for negligence. We bought a licence of SketchUp well before Google bought @Last Software, who invented SketchUp and made it free for everyone (which is great! Have a go!). We updated to Google SketchUp Pro and have 2 licences, but the printery is using the freeware for financial gain. We convert our SketchUp model into a DWG AutoCAD file for draughting, the printery cannot.

In fact, we would have to audit and repair their model to our standard to get the drawings out, so if a client had paid the printery to do the design, they would need to pay someone else again to have it audited and draughted- an extra cost. I have a recognised NZ qualification, construction experience and am an 8 year veteran in 3D modelling versus an unqualified, inexperienced and uninsured enthusiast. And I can do it far quicker to boot.

Now here is the rub.

A couple of months ago our supermarket installed self serve, self scanning automated checkouts. I don’t use them. Why? I want the local staff to keep their jobs because I like them and they make for a great shopping experience. Also, I pay the wages of the checkout staff and bag packers in the cost of the grocery items. If the staff go, the groceries won’t get any cheaper!

But I digress. The first week they were in use at the market, a young part timer was loafing around; playing the fool at the manual checkout adjacent to the brand new automated one. I’m all for enjoying yourself at work, but the writing was on the wall not 5 feet away- all shiny and new and making inviting electronic chirps and whistles. If you were the owner walking by at that moment – saying to himself, “Aha!” - and looking to recoup expenses from the new checkout robots- how far down your mental list of “Employees I Must Retain At All Costs” would he be?

Now back to the original thread. If the printery is offering amateur 3D modelling services to interior designers, how long will it be before they are offering amateur 3D interior design to the public?

“Aha….”

‘So where the bloody hell are ya?’

Picture this. It’s after midnight and you’re a couple hours drive away from your bed passing through an unfamiliar town on the way home. Your eyes are drooping and you feel like a bite to eat and some coffee. No, change that. You only want a bite to eat but you need two coffees.

The only place open at that time of night is a big chain fast food drive through. The parking lot is sinister and dark, and food wrappers swirl eerily around like tumbleweed. There are no cars in front and no people in sight. You pull up to the microphone, where normally you are harassed for your order before your eyes can even focus on the menu.

Not this time. It’s eerily silent. “Hello?” You call a few times.

After an age an underpaid adolescent appears at the cashier till and there is a belligerent grunted reply; still clearly irritated at being torn away from his text messaging.

You collect your order, hope that his idea of good customer service extends to the washing of hands after using the toilet and begin a long drive home. Over the next couple of hundred kilometers you have the time to muse on the distinctly unfriendly transaction that occurred. Well, you think, I can’t blame people being surly; they’re probably on minimum wage, get badly treated by the boss and on weekends cop all sorts of verbal and material abuse from drunks. The weeknights are just probably their way of evening up the score by dishing some back. A couple of hours later, as you pull into your drive, home at last and safe, you almost begin to have warm feelings about the service you received.

Now the above scenario happened to me. At that time of night there was no competition. Had there been, I would have gladly given them my custom instead.

If you are in business, you may well be familiar with the caller ID on the phone showing an overseas phone call. It’s someone called ‘Sebastian’ with an accent from a country where you suspect the word ‘Sebastian’ has never been used to address anybody- at least politely. It used to be these people calling our business were from Manila, Bangkok or Mumbai and they had gleaned our details from some directory we all wish didn’t exist. Lately, perhaps due to search engine optimization for our recently launched website, things have gotten worse.

Now we get calls from Australian call centres.

You see, the callers from developing countries were, as a rule, persistent and often pushy to the point of being rude. They usually had thick accents, but always spoke clearly and with courtesy. You see, they were trying to sell me something, as opposed to the drive through cashier where I needed to buy something that they had a monopoly on.

We recently signed up with an Australian firm for some online advertising. The sales staff member was laid back and casual, but being born a Kiwi, I cut him a bit of slack as I thought he was new at the job and needed a break, being a young fulla and all. Then I got to speak with his supervisor for one reason or another. It started with ‘Gidday’, finished with ‘Cheers’ and I got called ‘Mate’ about 30 times in between. Now over here, we do things the same way; but only to people we have formed a relationship with, not that we’re talking to for the first time and should be trying to impress. But it got worse.

A bit later I was phoned by the Account Executive. He sounded like it was his first job since leaving school earlier that week- not bad for an Account Manager- and gave the impression he was lying on his back on the office floor scratching or picking some body part I don’t want to know about. He slurred and used so many slang or unintelligible words I thought he had me confused with a conjoined twin he shared a special language with.

Every now and again you’ll read in the business papers about a 18 year old who started an IT business that’s going great guns with a young and hip crew with no one over 22. Perhaps that’s what was going on at that company. I can’t accurately recall the conversation, but the tone of it went something like this:

“Hey, Sid, I’ve jus’ started a compn’y mate, we’s flat out like a lizard mate, could do wiv’ a bleedin’ hand, mate. An’ since you bin’ lika bruvver to me mate, I fought, like. ‘Yo! Sid’s me cobber n’ all, you’s can start Mondee,’ watcha reckon mate? Cumta fink of it, mate, you got any more mates wivva giftova gab, mate?”

Why would you talk to a customer like that, if you’re in the business of selling?

The advertising copy however, exceeded my expectations- it managed to be ordinary at best, and had no spelling mistakes at least.

Another Australian working from a New Zealand office of an unrelated company also had a similar phone manner. I kid you not: Twice while they were in the process of working through the details the salesperson was slurping soup. On another occasion I was told to hang on while they made their carpooling arrangements with a hand cupped over the phone.

Hey, I eat at my desk on occasion but not while on the phone to people I need to impress!

Having said that, the proposal when it came through indeed looked as if it had been used as a napkin on a desk during lunchtime and fished out of the bin before hometime, so it wasn’t as if our already low expectations were dashed.

Both advertisers failed to incorporate our slogans, corporate colours or attempt consistency with existing material in their copy, leaving us to work on it. We pay for an advertising design service and end up doing the work ourselves because our skills are better than those who tell us we need their services. What gives? We don’t need their services, just the medium. And as it turned out, the number of responses we had to the advertising we placed was zero.

The title of this blog comes from the infamous Aussie tourism TV campaign, apparently banned in Britain. My answer is, “As far away as I can get!” Thank goodness global warming will increase the distance.

Disclaimer: Some of my best friends are Aussies.

Post Script: A recent earthquake has shifted us 30cm closer to Australia. (!)