Deal Stories

Hi I'm Jill and I am about to tell you what I did for my husband Ian and his company. Ian owns and runs a small engineering company that seemed permanently on the verge of gong bust. He seemed to have a good turnover of work, but the cost margins were so tight that there was virtually no profit in it. They made parts for several car companies and an aircraft company. The tolerances were so tight that there was often waste...

I thought I had heard everything and done just about every deal that I could with my small business, but this guy was way out there. He had just asked me to price up some work for him. The materials came to £13,000 and the labour to about £4,000. He looked pretty well heeled and I thought he could pay, when he started to ask questions like how much for cash and can you come down on that a bit. I gave him what I thought wa...

Bill had just returned from Hull. He was excited when telling me that he had met with six Arabs and had provisionally agreed a deal with them. It would be our firm's largest contract to date. Then he told me that they would be coming in a fortnights time to firm up and finalize on the deal. He told me that we would be expected to wine dine and entertain them the evening before the most vital meeting. He then let slip that...