I picked the Indian company. As a consideration to the other companies who spent time putting a bid together, I told them who I picked and why.
The guy from Colorado, the runner-up, sent me a frustrated e-mail. He said he knew for a fact that nobody in India speaks English natively and that my project will be doooomed. DOOOOOOMED! Turn back now!
(It's too bad that he didn't attach an animated .gif of a waving American flag, because that would totally have swayed me.)
Here's my complaint: the American companies are a bunch of idiots. None of them did anything to distinguish themselves from each other except competing on price. Each of their websites in turn claims to have the best turn-around time, the best quality, the most highly educated employees. They know that they're competing against Indian companies, why are they still trying to compete on price?
For fucks sake, there's a million things they could be doing to say, "Yeah, I know they're cheaper, but we have this killer feature you're really going to love." They could have 24-hour staff to knock a project out in two days instead of a week. Or they could have a distributed network of college students working online like Amazon. Or they could even back their claims up of "highest quality" with a money-back satisfaction guarantee.
So for them to do none of these things and instead be saying, "You're an asshole for picking a company located in a country where $15/hour is a good job. You should give it to us, we pay our coders minimum wage. You know we can't compete with their prices. Buy American! Go America!"
It's weak and lazy and ridiculous, and I will make fun of you in my blog.
The guy from Colorado, the runner-up, sent me a frustrated e-mail. He said he knew for a fact that nobody in India speaks English natively and that my project will be doooomed. DOOOOOOMED! Turn back now!
(It's too bad that he didn't attach an animated .gif of a waving American flag, because that would totally have swayed me.)
Here's my complaint: the American companies are a bunch of idiots. None of them did anything to distinguish themselves from each other except competing on price. Each of their websites in turn claims to have the best turn-around time, the best quality, the most highly educated employees. They know that they're competing against Indian companies, why are they still trying to compete on price?
For fucks sake, there's a million things they could be doing to say, "Yeah, I know they're cheaper, but we have this killer feature you're really going to love." They could have 24-hour staff to knock a project out in two days instead of a week. Or they could have a distributed network of college students working online like Amazon. Or they could even back their claims up of "highest quality" with a money-back satisfaction guarantee.
So for them to do none of these things and instead be saying, "You're an asshole for picking a company located in a country where $15/hour is a good job. You should give it to us, we pay our coders minimum wage. You know we can't compete with their prices. Buy American! Go America!"
It's weak and lazy and ridiculous, and I will make fun of you in my blog.
VIEW 5 of 5 COMMENTS
fallfromgrace:
I agree with you. Are you going to Tawnya's for thanksgiving?
fractured:
I would have gone with the Indian company if they agreed to supply me with curries and naan.