On the beach in Tenerife one day while Louis was swimming in the sea and I was ‘minding the stuff’ a lovely African lady (from Senegal) came up to have a chat with me and offered me a massage or some jewellery or any number of other things that she was peddling on the beach.
I genuinely had no cash at all on me so I was of no use to her.
As I was chatting to her and finding out where she came from, she leaned down and tied something around my wrist which she told me was a ‘good luck’ bracelet which would make sure I never had any bad luck again.
She tied it quite tightly in a tight knot.
She asked me if I had any children and I explained I have 3, she offered to tie 3 more around my wrist for my children so I could give them those when I got home, so that they could have a lifetime of luck too.
I explained again that I had no means of paying her for this which she did not believe.
At this point the price for the thing that she tied around my wrist altered and started to reduce over time until it reached £0 and I gave her my wrist to untie the bracelets that she'd tied on and to take them away.
We had a lovely conversation and a really nice and warm interchange and she told me that I was a very kind and lovely person and I apologised that I had no money to give her.
It’s just interesting though how in all aspects of business, price is fluid depending upon the circumstances.
We try to pretend that a bar of dairy milk costs the same as a bar of dairy milk but it doesn’t.
It depends on what time of year it is, where things are in the supply chain or the delivery chain or what offer is on or how much spare they have in the warehouse.
For the lady from Senegal it was 10 euros for the first bracelet and in the end I could have all 4 for 5 euros.
She had already made the bracelets and already paid for the raw materials and in essence her time was a zero cost.
For her any money for the bracelets was enough money, the only problem was I had no money.
Most businesses just in time price. The cost of my return flights to Tenerife including taking a bike were £370.
If I wanted to get home in a hurry the day that I met the lady from Senegal, they would have been £39 for the same flight in the other direction.
Blog Post Number - 2975
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