A Catalog Of Errors, Part 11
Back in the 1980s, I work for a small, privately-owned sporting goods company as a catalog designer. I am the advertising department. Just me.
I create four catalogs a year, and they drive most of our mail-order sales. Pre-internet, that’s about $700K a year.
We send them via bulk mail through a mailing service. That requires a bulk mail permit, which has to be printed on the catalog itself. Technically, it’s called a “fiche.”
Enter a new boss. For some reason, the owner hires him as a favor to a friend. From day one, he micromanages, questions everything, and wrecks my already tight schedule.
This is before computers. Everything is by hand: typing out copy, photocopying reductions, developing film myself, making prints, sending them to the printer for screening, and metal plate burning. Missing deadlines is not an option. Crunch time means multiple sixteen-hour days.
I complain to the owner, but he doesn’t care. Meanwhile, the new boss keeps hitting me with threats of:
New Boss: “My way or you’re fired!”
The latest pre-summer catalog is finished, and summer is our BIG season. For the first time, the new boss insists on approving my mock-up. It’s just photocopied sheets stapled together, but he demands to sign off.
He sends it back with pointless revisions. And one note:
New Boss: “Remove that ugly permit box. It’s not needed.”
Where he worked before, their mailers were stuffed into envelopes that carried the permit, but we print it directly on the catalog.
I ask him to initial the changes since this is the final version going to the printer the next day. No time to check it again. He does.
I know it’s going to be a disaster. It’s something I would never have done myself.
50,000 catalogs are printed and shipped directly to the mailer. The day they arrive, the sales rep calls.
Rep: “We can’t mail your catalogs.”
Minimum two-week delay. Money wasted. Sales lost.
The owner storms into my office, literally screaming. My boss is also furious, shouting over him. Spittle flying, veins bulging.
I calmly explain what happened. The threats to fire me. The changes. The missing permit box. Then I show them the final copy, initialled by the new boss.
At first, the owner wants to give the new boss a second chance. Then the bill comes in from the printer. They had to stamp 50,000 catalogs by hand. And we had to rent the printer’s permit since that’s what was on the stamp.
Rental and labor: almost $8,000. Adjusted for inflation, that’s $20,000. Early summer sales were down by $50K compared to previous years (nearly $200K today).
The new boss is fired.
And me? I’m left alone after that.
Related:
A Catalog Of Errors, Part 10
A Catalog Of Errors, Part 9
A Catalog Of Errors, Part 8
A Catalog Of Errors, Part 7
A Catalog Of Errors, Part 6
