Chapter 8: Making It Work

I spent much of the next three days introducing Fiona to the five accounts I expected her to manage. I wanted to spell out the changes to the Tracy plant to these customers and what it would mean in terms of product opportunities for them. They knew of Statewide, of course, but none had done business with the firm and luckily, they didn't have a strong negative opinion of it. My job was to let them know that it would be a Flex Tek company and would be producing the quality and service they had come to expect. I made sure they had the brochures on the new equipment to understand this was going to be a ground-up renovation.

I can get a little carried away when I talk about Flex-Tek and our philosophy with the customers. Those who have been with us for a while know me and understand where I'm coming from. Where I have to be more careful is with people I don't know well ... or not at all in some cases. I could be coming on too strong and putting them off by being too aggressive. I would have to be particularly careful with Fiona's customer base. I sure didn't want to alienate them.

"You're really something, Andy," Fiona said at the end of our first day. "You are a true believer in your company and what it can do. The people we saw today don't need much convincing. You've already proven yourself. It'll be a different story with my accounts. They've heard we have new owners, but they don't know anything about you. On top of that, you're not American. You're going to have to let me lead when we talk to them."

"Sure. I know I tend to oversell at times. You're right, I am a true believer and when we get Tracy up and running, you'll be one too. It's fun to have that much confidence in the people you work with. That confidence is passed along to the customers and when you come through for them, it just reinforces their belief in us."

"The world according to G. B. Andrews," she laughed. "The Elmer Gantry of the packaging business."

"Go ahead and laugh. You'll see for yourself."

"If these first two clients we called on are any indication, you don't have to convince me. I'm waiting to see how my customers react when you pass out some of those samples. That's going to be a real revelation to them."

"Our customers seemed to accept you," I said. "I didn't see any problem with your handling their accounts."

"No ... I didn't detect any concern about that either. So that took care of one of the coffee roasters and the chocolate company. What's next?"

"We'll see East Bay tomorrow. They have a large variety of product they pack for private label. Some of it is straight commodity film with an over-label, and some, for the bigger companies, is printed. East Bay will do trial packages, small test market runs, airline food service packaging and that sort of thing. Not huge volume, but if we can service them and make a dollar, we'll take the business. They know that and we've bailed them out a couple of times when other suppliers have let them down."

"So this should be a fairly easy call then?"

"Yes, more so because the buying department is run by a woman. I know she'll be really pleased that you'll represent us. She's always on my case about hiring women. I told her I have two women in sales in Canada and I'm always on the lookout for talent. I half expected her to recommend someone, but when I challenged her, she couldn't come up with a name. So tomorrow should be an interesting morning. I'm sure Maureen will give you the full tour and you'll see just how diverse they are."

"You have two women in sales in Canada?" she asked, sounding surprised.

"Yup. They are two of the best three sales people I have ... or had, I should say."

"Huh! Is that why you wanted me to work for you?"

"Your results said you were the best and your boss said you were the best, so it didn't seem like much of a risk."

"Lorne said that?"

"He did and he wasn't kidding. Now that I've received a bunch of positive feedback from your customers as well, it was a no-brainer."

I saw the smile on her face as we drove along. She was pleased with the praise from her customers. That means a lot to any salesperson. You can never hear you were doing a good job for them too many times.

By the time I had turned over all five customers to Fiona, I was confident that she could handle the workload and the clients. She wasn't short on product knowledge and was regularly asking questions about products and our capabilities. I saw her take notes often and refer to our brochures which spelled out our dimensional and printing abilities as well as bag and pouch styles.

"Do you ever get involved with large volume customers?" she asked one day.

"Yes, we do. Several have come to us through recommendation and we are willing to take on some of that business as long as we can maintain a reasonable margin. We have no interest in commodity business, but when it comes to high quality and good service, some of the bigger customers are willing to sacrifice a lower price to get what we offer. Our waste and yield rates on form-fill-and-seal equipment are significantly better than industry averages and that often makes up for price gaps."

"We should play golf this weekend," she said after a pause. It was a complete non sequitur.

"Great," I said without thinking. "I can rent clubs at a public play course I'm sure."

"It's supposed to be sunny and 60˚ this Saturday. Should I book a time?"

"Go ahead. Just let me know where and when."

"No problem," she said without looking at me. "Why don't you plan to stay over Friday night and I'll get us to the course on time?"

I gave her a look that indicated my surprise but said nothing. Never look a gift horse in the mouth as the saying goes. She was still wearing that secret smile that I'd begun to get used to.

Two could play this game. "Are we going to be able to wander around nude?"

"Only inside the house, smartass," she said, punching me lightly in the shoulder.

"Okay then ... I guess I can make it."

"Then it's settled. Our second date," she snorted.

I was dying to ask about Tina, but decided not to. I doubted she would be around.

Fiona suggested I show up about six o'clock on Friday and that's exactly when I arrived. Never keep a lady waiting, especially a willing lady.

There was something different about Fiona, but it didn't dawn on me right away. She put the flowers in a vase (yes I did the flowers and wine thing again) and opened the wine. When she walked to me with the two glasses of wine I figured out what was different. She wasn't wearing a bra. Her breasts we swaying nicely under her the limited constraint of a light cotton pullover with a deep V neck. I'm sure she was well aware that I could make out the darker areas of her areolas.

She handed me a glass and I toasted her.

"Thank you for inviting me again. I like your top," I grinned.

"Why, thank you, sir. It fits rather well don't you think?"

"It fits exceptionally well," I said, reaching out to feel the side of her breast and the soft material. "Yes ... exceptionally."

She responded by lightly rubbing her hand over my crotch, confirming that my erection was well under way. I wondered just how far she wanted to take this teasing at this particular moment.

She moved back to the kitchen and I noticed the dining room table was not set.

"I have something different in mind for tonight," she announced. "I thought we'd graze our way through the night. Just the two of us, nibbling on a variety of tasty things."

"That sounds very nice ... and interesting ... different. I'm all for it."

"Good. I like to try different things. One of my friends suggested this. She said it would be much more ... intimate."

"I'm also in favour of intimate," I grinned.

"I thought you would be. Come and see what I have for us. You said you could eat almost anything."

She began to pull plates out of the oven and refrigerator. There were a number of very tasty looking dishes. I recognized some fresh crab, breaded calamari (one of my favourites), cocktail sausage rolls in puff pastry, a plate of raw vegetables with a dip, what looked like spanakopita tricorns in filo pastry, a pasta salad, and a variety of little dessert cakes. There was more than enough for us.

"You've gone to a lot of trouble to make all this," I commented. "It looks wonderful. I know I'm going to eat too much."

"Thank you for the compliment, but I got almost everything from my favorite delicatessen. I made the tzatziki sauce, vegetable dip and vegetables. The rest was store-bought."

"I still say it's an inspired idea. I can do grazing, especially on a Friday night after a long, tiring week."

"Not too tiring, I hope," she said with a sly smile.

"I'm sure I'll be at full strength when it's needed."

She folded into my arms after putting our wine glasses aside. The kiss was long and deep and very welcome.

"We've got all the time in the world," she said softly.

"I have a feeling we're going to need it," I said, rubbing my prominent erection against her tummy.