How to break up with your busy, inconsiderate and expensive picture framer!

You have that sinking feeling.  Your picture framer doesn't greet you like he used to. He's too busy to see you and you are now starting to see him as an  expensive picture framer. He sends his junior staff to serve you instead. If you do manage to speak to him, he's curt, cold and distant. When he gets around to making your picture frames, he's not on time anymore, he's always late. And when he's late, he doesn't ring to apologize, like he used to. You feel like he's brushing you off. And his prices have trebled! You used to have such an easy, carefree and inexpensive relationship. You felt  safe and  secure . But somehow ... somehow you've drifted away from one another and grown apart.

You wanted to keep your old, trusty and reliable picture framer forever, but he changed. His business has changed and his clientele is different now. He's meeting and working for other, more exciting customers. These new customers are more adventurous than you and have deeper pockets. He doesn't seem to need you any more!

The scoundrel! You were so enamoured with his picture frames and picture framing that you couldn't see the warning signs. But now you see, and you can remember all the times he let you down and hurt you. First of all, it was his escapade with trendy, upmarket frames. He grew tired of the budget, everyday, picture frames that he'd been giving you for years. Boring, not good enough he though, if not said, about them. He began flirting and being seen with the latest, trendy, upmarket, exotic Italian mouldings.

From his lips now came names like Bellini, Roma and Guerrini, his new friends. His prices to you doubled, trebled even, to support his new, lavish picture framing lifestyle. He shocked you with his new fees and charges. He had transmogrified into just another expensive picture framer! .  You gasped in disbelief, how could he do this to you? Next came the abrupt withdrawal of his ready-made picture frames. They were cheap, imported Asian stock and pre-made plastic frames.

These were a salvation and boon to your finances because you framed so much in them. He stopped stocking them because he said, these tended to cheapen his image and customer relationship with you. But you felt angry and betrayed because you remembered the good framing times you had. Your wedding gifts, your family photos, it was all so exhilaratingly inexpensive! Alas, no more! But the last straw was his unwanted, abusive upselling of his expensive picture frames.

He became infatuated with esoteric picture framing practices and recondite framer techniques. Suddenly and unexpectedly he began to museum and conservation picture frame all of your artwork. He didn't ask your permission, he did this to you when you didn't feel like it or wanted to. He forced himself on your pictures and you felt violated and humiliated. The cad! How could he do this to you after all the picture framing you'd done together?  You ached for his past and fast mounting methods.

Gluing down was a quick, easy and this mounting method satisfied and fulfilled you for years! You wistfully recalled how happy you were with ordinary, white-core, acid-free mat boards for years! But not any more. He then started sticking Japanese rice paper hinges, rag mats, museum glass to all your stuff and charged you the earth for it! In vain you begged him to stop his picture framing misuse and abuse. He was framing your cheap Balinese prints with the most expensive materials he could buy.

Worst of all, he broke your pricing trust! His invoices became frightening and threatened your financial health. For your own sanity and health, your picture framing relationship had to end, and it did. You spoke to friends and family, picked up your courage and confronted him! He had no glib answers or smooth excuses when you showed him not one, but several invoices from other framers.The other framer's bills were a third of the prices he'd charging you.

The sordid truth finally came out! He confessed that expensive conservation framing wasn't really needed for cheap holiday art. Eventually, he admitted that he'd been over-framing you, taking you for a ride, profiteering at your expense. Angrily you then threw the papers at him and stormed out, vowing never to return. And you haven't! That showed him! Hopefully that taught him a lesson and might make him think twice before over-framing for other young, innocent, trusting, naive customers, as you once were. On the subject of picture framer's ethics the post Beware of shonky picture framers and dodgy picture framing practices may be somewhat pertinent. thank you for reading this post "How to break up with your busy, inconsiderate and expensive picture framer!".