sundance-communications.com/forum Forums TDM Business Telephone Systems Comdial Telephones & Systems Comdial 816

Got a call out of the blue from a customer I lost contact with over the years. They wanted a new system. Old system was Comdial Executech 816
I installed in 1986. I had not talked to them in about 10 years. They had no other vendor. If a phone went bad they sent it to Comdial.
I moved them to present location 1990. Everything was just as I left it, phone locations matched the plan tucked behind blocks at MDF.
This business can get erie at times.

They built those old beasts to last forever. We still get a ton of old 6414 in to have their keypads rebuilt.

It's funny. The day you start thinking "I wonder what happened to that customer, and who's been doing their service work all this time", they end up calling you to move them to a new location or install a new system. Some customers are more loyal than we give them credit for. Others, well you know...

I'm at the stage now where some of my accounts I have had for 20 years and when I go to their office I spend the first 20 minutes talking about our kids and our lives since we last met. I was just having this same conversation with my wife, about how nice it is to go to site where you have known the owner for 20 years and know his kids are the same age as yours and all that.
Mark

That is all too true. We still have plenty of Executech customers from the mid 1980's out there. For some of the ones who elected to replace their systems for no apparent reason, we are holding onto their old stuff. You get to know customers like these over time and their expectations.

When they think they need something new, you sell them what they think they need. At the same time, you know what they don't like. It's nice to keep their old system handy so it can be put back where it belongs when they change their mind. This happens a lot.

It's the customers who got used to quality but got carried away with trends who know best what really works. This is why I am such an avid fan of 1A2.

The original Executech and Executech II systems were some of the most rock-solid systems out there. Even a 308 KSU weighed 20 pounds! I look forward to the calls for service (usually moves) because they always preface the conversation with "the system you sold us twenty-x years ago has done so well". It makes you feel good.

On a somewhat humorous note; we had a pretty important cutover to a Comdial 2000 in 1990 going on after-hours. I couldn't get anybody to work late, so I asked my wife, then nine-months pregnant to help with placing the phones out.........She waddled around for hours, placing and testing phones, installing desis, you name it. We got done at 10:30 PM, about two hours earlier than expected.

The next morning, our son was born. This customer has since gone out of business, but the major parties remembered her efforts. Despite the fact that these people have gone on to work for other companies, they have still come to us for phones at their new places of employment. Some are for the second or third time around.

The first question they seem to always have is "how is your son doing". I guess that with that being said, I will always feel an association with the original Comdial. This is a true story.

Now, when referring to today's products, that's another story with any brand.