While there are all kinds of reasons why in certain vendor - purchaser scenarios the parties may want various aspects of the transaction kept in confidence, in the retail scenario there is no good reason why one customer or group of customers should be treated any differently than another or that any information be confidential part from the purchaser's personal/financial information. Sure, if I buy 100 razors I can expect to negotiate a volume discount but two guys buying one razor should both pay the same price and get the same terms. To do otherwise will eventually get out and it will leave a bad taste in customer's mouths. One of the potential problems I see with the whole online sales combined with social media is the expectation/necessity for artisans/vendors to communicate with their customers one on one. There can develop an expectation of favourable treatment from the customers because after all, we're "friends" right? and friends will do each other a solid right? Thats a lot of pressure to put on a guy trying to grow a business and make a living but if you fall into that trap its a slippery slope and who knows where it leads but its not a good place in my opinion. Anger and resentment, loss of business, harm to your reputation. All bad stuff. My advice? Make a good product, give excellent customer service equally to all your customers, make problems right in all cases. No exceptions no special treatment - other than everybody gets special treatment.
Example - A number of years ago I was dining at a high end seafood place in town for lunch as the guest of some colleagues. It was an Oyster Bar and Dining Room. I like oysters but didn't see them on the menu. I asked the waiter and he said that they only served oysters in the oyster bar. Fair enough. We ordered. A few minutes later four waiters walked by our table with a tray of oysters in each hand and delivered them to a nearby table.(thats like, 8 dozen oysters. I would have been happy with just one) I asked our waiter what was up with that? He said that that the people at the table were friends of the managers (we were just paying customers) and they could have whatever they wanted.
Nice. I never went back there again, and I put my personal curse on their restaurant. It eventually closed a few years later. My curses sometimes take a while to work. My point is, they treated their customers differently, and it annoys customers when that happens. You can bet I didn't have anything nice to say to anyone about that restaurant between the time of that incident and their closing. I never said anything untrue or unfair. I like to think I played a small part in that closing.
