I've recently had a knife maker FRONT me a knife I went weak in the knees for that he posted on this forum! 'Pay for it as you can', said he. Sent it to me right away, he did. Trust in me, he has.
Had another who I paid in installments, whilst he toiled over a totally custom project. He sent the knife as soon as it was done and right around the time all installments came to their conclusion. Real time, pay as you go!
Made an upfront payment via barter, waited a couple years and received a knife far and beyond the scope of what was agreed to. Overdeliver!
I am fortunate to have mostly dealt with knife makers who have left me with fond memories of a mutually beneficial transaction, and to these kindred spirits, I pledge unswerving loyalty and devotion toward helping them to succeed. That tiny minority who have had the opposite impact- well, there are no mistakes, only lessons. Repeating mistakes goes beyond lesson learning, and is a form of self flagellation and I try very hard to avoid self defeating tendencies- of which I have in the past had a proclivity toward
Everything that has anything to do with how well you can run and grow a business has everything to do with relationships. Patience is important in all relationships and grows from respect. Without empathy and respect for people, running your own business can eat your face off.
Questions like this OP should cause one to look into the mirror and accept one's limitations, in order find ways to work with and around them. If taking deposits, or not, is truly the best way to both minimize your faults and liabilities, while providing your strengths with opportunities for a workout, then you should- or shouldn't- take them depending on what kind of pressures you can handle, or even thrive on.
As a business owner, you will be exposed to others' shortcomings and you will be let down. If you stay down, you will fail. Protecting yourself from those who manipulate are lessons, and those lessons are accelerated when you take the risk and dive in to your own business, but lessons that you will both learn from and be injured by. This is where exposure to your own shortcomings is made available and when adjustments can be made. Like feeding protein to the muscle, after tearing it down, you always have to build up and get stronger in order to thrive.
