Can bad customers be reformed into model citizens?

In a college marketing class I first learned the 80/20 rule. It means 80 percent of your sales will come from the top 20 percent of your customers.

Some 20 years later, this rule pretty much holds true. But if I were a college marketing professor today, I’d teach my students yet another equation — the 5/2/90 rule.

This states that 5 percent of your sales will come from 2 percent of your customers, but will account for 90 percent of your headaches. This is the kind of stuff our young professionals need to learn as they’re heading out into the real world.

I basically put bad customers into three categories: Deadbeats, Scatterbrains and Just Plain Jerks.

Deadbeats. This is a pretty straightforward group — they don’t pay their bills. They usually have sob stories about why they’re behind, and will often pay off their balances only when they need something else from you.

The best way to deal with these people is to close out their accounts. Make them pay everything C.O.D., and if they don’t like it, they can buy elsewhere. No, this isn’t as easy as it sounds.

They’ll say they have a big job coming up, but their story is often only a siren’s song. Don’t fall into the trap and don’t think the only way you’re going to collect the current balance is to keep selling to this customer.

I recently told a deadbeat that we closed his account and I needed a credit card number for all future deliveries. The customer was furious and said he’d never buy from us again.

After hanging up the phone, I said, “He’ll be calling back in two hours. I bet he has bad debt all over town and has nowhere else to turn.” I was wrong. He called back in 15 minutes with a credit card number.

Is everybody behind on payments a deadbeat? No. If a loyal customer of 20 years misses one payment, that’s life. If a previous good payer suddenly falls behind due to current economic conditions but has a plan to pay you back, that’s a different story.

But bad debt from bad customers will put good companies out of business.

Scatterbrains. These customers are terribly unorganized. They’re the ones with a stack of papers so high on their dashboards, it’s a wonder they can see traffic ahead of them.

With scatterbrains, you make a delivery and they yell, “Where are my river birch trees?” You then respond, “You never told me you needed river birch trees.”

Just Plain Jerks. Some people are born jerks, some people are raised that way. Either way, they’re here to make our lives miserable.

They use terrible language and use it at high volume. They beat you down on price, and they complain about your quality. They want special treatment though it’s never warranted. They are never, ever satisfied.

My theory is that, like bullies in elementary school, most of these people are really insecure. As landscapers and as businesspeople, they don’t know what they’re doing and they take it out on us.

So the ultimate solution would be to let these jerks blow off steam and, when the correct moment arises, ask the right questions to get to the root of their problems. Then you can offer advice to enhance their landscape skills and improve their businesses. They will be grateful, and be a better person to deal with in the future.

That, or you can rush to the front gate and put up the “closed” sign whenever you see their trucks heading toward the nursery.

I’m leaning toward Option No. 2.