Michelle Nelson rugging "Beware"

[d_wilson]

The customer is always right.  Thats business 101.  Instead of justifying to customers or potential customers, say youre sorry, youre right, and I'm doing everything I can to fix this and start repairing your image. If you had come out and said this in the beginning this thread wouldnt have gained so much traction.

[Bean Counter]

The customer is always right.  Thats business 101.  ...

I don't agree with this opinion. Or I must have missed it in 'business 101' while earning my business degree.

Business owners should always bend over backwards to satisfy their customers, but some customers are just plain unreasonable or on the friggin moon. Not saying one way or the other whether that applies to this situation. But the ethos "the customer is always right" will ruin any business sooner or later. 

[Romulus1297]

Good Grief.  Its been 116 months since visited my taxi for a full size black bear mount. Luckily my receipts were in the safe because he couldn't find them and the form #. The bear is in a box and has not lost any hair. I do know where I dropped the bear off and have phone ## Now I have to make room for another bear mount. Wait I haven't checked in lately. Maybe I should check in once and a while. My fault. It is harder to find a spot for the bear then call my taxi 

[grundy53]

Good Grief.  Its been 116 months since visited my taxi for a full size black bear mount. Luckily my receipts were in the safe because he couldn't find them and the form #. The bear is in a box and has not lost any hair. I do know where I dropped the bear off and have phone ## Now I have to make room for another bear mount. Wait I haven't checked in lately. Maybe I should check in once and a while. My fault. It is harder to find a spot for the bear then call my taxi 

Jeez! Ten years? Thats ridiculous.

sent from my typewriter

[BOWHUNTER45]

Hoyt_Alaska's work is done and will be shipped today.

THOSE LOOK KILLER  Just look how thick the hair is on those rugs ....CRAZY !! Good job Michelle 

[boneaddict]

Considering Iceman was a gentleman and could have ripped you a new one in regards to your service, I am surprised, (no I am not) that you decided to engage and say he is essentially lieing or posting false information.       Honestly, you had ample oppurtunities to right this and other wrongs and you continue to roll with it. 

[billythekidrock]

I am happy to report that I have finally received my October 2009 bear rug and skull from Michelle.

This has taken an unfortunate 53 total months from start to finish.

I was told that I did not properly care for my bear rug which resulted in hair slip on the side of the face of the bear.

This information was not new to you.  I told you several times my concerns about your hide and the following issues.

You killed your Bear and then threw it in a creek to cool it off.  Then put it in a cooler for 5 DAYS before I even got it.  Head and Paws were still in and it was soaked!  It had ZERO ice in the cooler when I got it and it had 2" of bloody water in the cooler.  Hair was already shedding on the front of the neck before I even started pulling the skull.  Your bear had  3" x 8" section of hair slip on the side of your Bears face between the eye and the ear.  Your Bear was only 5'4".  You also had several smaller size slip areas on the front of the neck.  Not to mention that your hide was sheddy.

On the other hand I was informed that the issue she encountered with her tanner caused problems as well, as more than one taxidermist pulled their work a few years ago from their tanner. My bear rug was also included in the last batch from this sub par tanner.

Incorrect!  I never said that the tanner caused problems with your hide, other than it taking longer to get it back.  I started working on your hide the instant it came in.  Preped it, salted it, and drove it 1.25 hours to the tannery to try and save it.  At the time the tanneries quality hadn't started going down hill.  The only thing was there turn around getting longer.

Please feel free to verify this with Bucklucky!  I was the first taxidermist that noticed the quality of the Old Tannery was going down hill in early 2010.  Bucklucky, ME, and a few other taxidermists all quit using this tannery around the same time. 

To say that I pulled my stuff years after everyone else is complete BS! ! !  I was the first one to notice the quality change and I pulled my stuff the same time everyone else! ! !

I was told that it took a long time to locate a replacement patch of face hair for my specific bear.

This is correct.  Due to the fact that not all "black" bears have the same hair structure.  Hair length, diameter, luster of the hair, and the direction the hair is going on the face all has to be close to exact.  Otherwise the repair would be very noticeable.  I went through around 16-18 different Bears faces before I found a match.

I was told by Michelle, that she hesitated contacting me after my dual hip replacement surgery. Then later when I was diagnosed with cancer, she did not contact me because she believed that I was mad at her for some reason.

Michelle claims that she sent me a pm which advised me that the bear was done somewhere around Christmas 2012. She also admitted that she noted that the tongue was not installed in the bear and that it was not really done then.

Incorrect.  You said I had not contacted you for 20 months.  When in fact I sent you a PM on February 9th 2013 inquiring about your double hip replacement.  This was your response to me via PM.

Walking without a cane. Pretty happy with the new hips. Still some muscle pain, but no bone on bone pain anymore.

The next morning on Feb 10, 2013 I responded to the above PM and asked you "If you were moving around well enough and felt up to picking up your Bear Rug."

You never responded. . . . . . . Back in 2012 I told you that what ever was left on your Rug ($325) was not due and that I considered your Rug and Skull paid in full. . . . . . I assumed because I didn't get an immediate response that you were either not up to coming down to pick it up, trying to get a day figured out to come get it, or trying to arrange for someone else to pick it up, or you were just mad at me for the length of time I had your bear.  Several weeks went by after I  told you it was done did I find out you had cancer.  When I found out you had cancer I assumed that was the reason you hadn't come and gotten your Rug. 

I was not the only member of Hunting Washington that told you that your rug was done over the last year.

BTW it took me a whooping 2 minutes to put the tounge in. 



I was told by someone else that the rug had been misplaced or lost in a freezer.

Who ever told you this was apparently just giving you there opinion, because as you can see by your Bear Rug at your house this was inaccurate.

Many members on this site have contacted me with similar complaints regarding Michelle not being reachable by phone or email. Michelle claimed to me yesterday that she gets hundreds of emails on this site and her taxidermy site. She also claimed that she did not get any of her emails at her business site. That she just learned recently that her emails were not getting to her.

Incorrect.  I told you there are "days" when I have gotten and sent in upwards of a 100 PM''s on this site.  I have a screen shot posted in another thread showing that.

As for E-mails.  Back when Hotmail was transitioning over to Outlook they had a bunch of bugs.  There were days I would get tons of E-mails spanning a 2 week period.  They wouldn't come in the day they were sent they would come in, in groups.  This lasted for months.  I didn't realize that this was happening for a while because I really do not receive a ton of E-mails from customers.  Once they finnaly changed the layout I coulnd't get my E-mail to load on my computer.  Shortly after I couldn't log on.  As soon as I found out it was happening I switched over to Gmail.  It took several months before I was able to log back in to my Hotmail account.  Since I changed over to Gmail I very rearly ever log on to the Hotmail account.

I had the old E-mail pulled off my website and the new one put on.  What was happening was when someone would click on my E-mail link to send me a message it wasn't sending it to Gmail it was sending it to my old Hotmail account.  Several days ago I logged into my old Hotmail account to get an E-mail address I knew was on there.  Saw that a newer customer had send me an E-mail.  A customer that had never been given my old one.  I answered his E-mail and gave him the G-mail account.

He then sent me an E-mail to my G-mail account and said that he had clicked on my Website E-mail and the Hotmail account was what he was given.  I went in immediately and got the problem figured out.  I made a post in the Virtual Campfire, yesterday I think, letting everyone that had sent me an E-mail through my website know.

   
I attempted to pick up this rug on Monday March 24th with a surprise visit. She claimed at that time that the rug was not available, it was at her friend "Toms" house for picture taking. This was the same excuse that she used on another bear rug she recently delivered late to another member who will remain anonymous unless he decides to post his story. Michelle told both this other member, and myself that the pictures of our bear rugs were not any good because of a defective SD card.



Your right it was a "Suprise Visit".  Considering you told me the best time for you to come on Monday was 6 - 9pm and I sent you a message on Sunday and told you that I wouldn't be available Monday afternoon because there was a good chance I would have to go see my doctor in the afternoon during urgent care (5pm - 9pm, might be 10pm).
 
First of all I asked Carpsniperg2 if it was alright if I held on to his Rug a few more weeks so I could get photos of it.  He agreed and we set a date that I would ship his rug to him (Mon the 17th).  I had ordered a couple back drops and I wanted to get nice photos for my website of his rug because it was another Closed mouth and black this time.  I took photos on my own at my house. 

Around 4-5 days before I shipped his rug I asked his permission to drive his rug over to him on the 19 or 20th in Goldendale because I had another mount to deliver.  It would have arrived the same day shipped or driven.  I felt it was safer to drive it then to ship it.  He gave his permission.  I told him if things change that his Rug would shio Monday the 17th!  I drove his rug over to him on the 20th.   

The day before I was to drive it over I pulled the SD Card out of the camera and was going to go through the photos.  Over 100 pic's of his Rug and none of them recorded.

--------------

On Saturday evening around 11:30pm I was wiping off a knife blade with a paper towel.  I was in a hurry and didn't realize that the knife blade was up and not down.  I was putting a lot of pressure on it to get the gooey meat off.  Ended up cutting my thumb, and not just a little bit. 

http://hunting-washington.com/smf/index.php/topic,150054.0.html

I called my doctor first thing Monday to try and get in to see if there was anything that could be done about the fact I had no feeling in my thumb from where I cut to the tip.  They said they were busy and that they would try and work me in and that they would call me.  If they couldn't see me before 5 they would be able to after hours urgent care.

Since I had no use of my left hand because of the way they wrapped it.  I called a friend of mine around noonish that does Photography to see I could come over. I had talked to him in the past about him showing me how to use my camera along with looking at his back drops.  So around 2pm I drove up there and brought the only Bear Rug I had done, along with a Boar and Deer Shoulder Mount.  I was in a hurry when I left and accidentally grabbed the same broken SD Card.  I wanted to see what each looked like on different back drops because the onse I ordered were not quite what I wanted.  While I was there the doctor called and said come in (4:30pm).  So I left and went to see him.  At 5:30 I left the doctor and had a voice message on my phone from a friend asking if I could watch there son because him and his wife were taking there daughter to do something and he didn't want to go.  So I headed home to meet them.  Within 20 minutes of getting home ICEMAN shows up at my house.   





I was finally able to pick up my rug yesterday evening. The rug looks good, the skull looked good. The quality of Michelle's work is fine.

Why am I posting this?

The reason that I am posting this is to finalize my part of this story. The simple fact is that it took 53 months to get a rug processed by Michelle. Her work is fine. Her business sense is not.

I will not be recommending anyone I know to take work there.

I may post up some pics after the weekend. Thanks. Finally done.

I was not the only member of Hunting Washington that told you that your rug was done over the last year.

If you are referring to me, yes, you told me that his bear was done and I told him. You also said you didn't think he would be up to picking it up due to his announcement of having cancer. I told you to give him a call and let him know since no one knew how bad the cancer was.

But telling me it was done and then making him wait to pick it up does not equate to "done" in my opinion. If it was done and "taking up space" and you "want it gone now" as you messaged me, then why weren't you proactive in getting it to him? Why wasn't it available for pickup when he dropped by the first time?

I would think for your customers piece of mind (and your business's sake) it would make better business sense to just apologize and move on to the other projects that are years behind. Posting here, on FB, designing non-taxidermy projects or talking on the phone for hours when you could be working on late projects only makes things worse.

[turkeyfeather]

I understand you to a point but you say I have a lot of repairing to do.  I don't think you understand my perspective.  People posting false information doesn't help either.

You have been caught in lie after lie, excuse after excuse and denial after denial. Your customers are not the ones posting false information. Either the problem is you or it's a massive conspiracy against you      Either way until you grow up and admit your shortcomings and learn to apologize and overcome them your business is going to continue it's slow death.

[ICEMAN]

Michelle, I have not tried to pass a lie about you. I do not have a history of lying. You know where I work. I have passed several background checks and polygraphs to get where I am. I do not lie.

I really get sick having to share this part about your business dealing with me, in public. Nobody wants to do this. This is not what I would wish on any business. This would have been so easy to bash on you if your actual work was poor, or even marginal. This is the biggest tragedy in my opinion. You excell at your trade. Your work is excellent. Open your freaking ears and listen to us. Listen to Hunt Wa.

You need to get someone else to run the business end of your business. Somehow, you need to get somebody else to run your front end of the business. You are personally unable to do it. I bet if you had someone else skilled at shielding you from emails, phone calls, etc....so that you could turn out excellent work, that you would triple your business.

You have the taxidermy thing down. You need business education.

I ran a business for 10 years. It is hard.

In my humble opinion, your first lesson of business would be to listen to your customer complaints, honor their complaints, and make changes based upon these complaints.

Look at how you have constantly had issues with complaints about folks not being able to reach you, or contact you, or feel that you have not contacted them.  No complaints about your finished product, but this other item. If you continue to make excuses, it is not going to work.

Listen, learn, change.

I am done criticizing you. I will post the rug on the wall and enjoy it. Thanks for the good work.

[Band]

Credibility is of vital importance to me.  Absolutely vital!  Michelle, your role to the public should be taxidermy, not owning a taxidermy business.

[shane cade]

aren't u guys tired of slamin her

[h20hunter]

Great 1st post. You do understand that by posting you are keeping a dead thread alive and to everyone's attention.

[Coastal_native]

Apparently we all got tired of slamming her on march 29th...the last time someone posted in this thread before today

[ICEMAN]

aren't u guys tired of slamin her

Now that you mention it, no. No, I am not tired of slamin her.

[bobcat]

Things could be worse- you could have had your bear at Alden's Taxidermy for seven years... Just to have it burned up when his shop burned down.