What Is The Value
of Your Word?...

14 hours that changed the course of a young start up company.

(true story-embellished
just a little bit)

Background:

Our client needed 3000 DVDs in Las Vegas on such and such date.  The President of ROM Squared promised his client that he wouldn’t have to worry: ROM Squared would meet the schedule.

ROM Squared’s president realized that the timeline for the client was critical.  The client needed the DVDs in Las Vegas to package with other materials for his 3000 sales people for a 7:00 A.M. meeting the next day.

The story:
9:00 am The day of the delivery date ROM Squared’s client calls to confirm that the shipment was indeed shipped.

9:15 am ROM Squared calls the nationally acclaimed shipping service for a tracking number and found to their horror that the shipper (on the clients account) sent the package to the client’s home office.

9:16 am ROM Squared calls the skeleton staff that was remaining at the client’s company to alert them of the mishap and to locate the package for preparation for counter to counter shipment.

10:30 am The client’s crew claims that they cannot locate the package.

12:00 pm ROM Squared President travels 100 miles to the client’s warehouse and finds the 3 boxes buried beneath other items in the “Raiders of The Lost Ark”  warehouse that were received

that day.

1:30 pm ROM Squared is blind sided with further trouble... due to stringent security after 9/11 no counter to counter shipments were to be accepted with out prior company security check and approval.

2:00 pm ROM Squared President calls 5 airlines from cell phone before he successfully  finds a puddle hopper connection from Milwaukee to Las Vegas via MEMPHIS!

2:45 pm ROM Squared president arrives back to Corporate HQ,  grabs gym work out bag and leaves for airport.

2:46 pm ROM Squared president gets a whiff of his gym bag and wishes he didn’t work out the previous night.

3:45 pm ROM Squared president is thanking State Trooper for his ticket.

4:00 pm ROM Squared president is doing an OJ through the MILWAUKEE airport with 3 boxes and a VERY SMELLY gym bag to the roar of the crowd.

4:01 to 7:29 pm President is reading fascinating Sky Mall Magazine and eating pretzels.

7:30 pm ROM Squared President is doing an OJ through the MEMPHIS airport with 3 boxes and gym bag to the roar of the crowd.

7:30-9:00 pm  President is reading very boring Sky Mall Magazine, eating pretzels, and noticing that his clothing is starting to smell like his gym bag!

9:01 pm  President is now doing the Oscar Madison "crawl" through the Vegas airport to unnoticing crowd with three HEAVY boxes and his pungent work out bag.

9:02 pm Hails Cab: Cabby tells President of ROM Squared, that his gym bag must go in the TRUNK!

9:30 pm  President arrives with his "reeking gym bag" at the posh resort of client and is just about arrested because he refuses to give the 3 "Boxes of Gold" to the Concierge and insists on delivering boxes PERSONALLY to his client.

9:35 pm Client in awe takes the "packages".  ROM Squared president notices his client’s nostrils are flaring. He appreciates his client’s polite silence. They shake hands, and then client informs ROM Squared president that he has booked a room.  Unfortunately it is 20 miles away because his hotel is full!

10:16 pm ROM Squared president enters his room, throws the gym bag in the bathroom, shuts the door...plops down in his bed, and stares at the ceiling.  He mentally calculates the cost and losses of this adventure.  He reconsiders what promises he will make in the future.  Sand man comes and KOs ROM Squared’s president.

11:00 pm the same evening ROM Squared president is shocked into consciousness by blaring telephone ringer.  He gropes for the phone, knocks it on the floor and picks it up.  It’s from his CLIENT’S president.  He is informed that he has heard about ROM Squared’s efforts: he offers a lucrative annual contract.

ROM Squared ponders this turn of events and thinks…”Yeahhhh BABYYYYY” and extends three days at the Mandalay Bay!

That is the true value of keeping ones word!

Read our Previous "President's Corner" Articles