You decide to start your own business. You\'ve mastered the art of 3-D printing,

Question

You decide to start your own business. You've mastered the art of 3-D printing, and plan to produce custom decorative accessories for things like banquets and weddings, specializing in table toppers.

Your business is going great, and you just landed a big customer - a local hotel. They order 50 plastic red-rose flower bouquets for a big wedding event, and need them by June 1. You and your staff start work, and have everything ready to go by May 30. Your contract with the hotel says that you will deliver the bouquets to the hotel on June 1 before noon. Your delivery van driver calls you at noon on June 1 and tells you that the hotel catering office and banquet room are not open yet and won't be open until 2:00 PM. Your delivery driver is booked for the remainder of the day and can't return to the hotel later. You tell him to leave a message for the catering office that the bouquets will be available at your production facility until 5:00 that day for them to pick up. No one ever picks them up, and when you send the hotel a bill, the hotel claims you failed to deliver and refuses to pay.

Who will win the lawsuit when you sue for the price of the bouquets? Why?

What if the hotel was a regular customer, and you usually just dropped the bouquets off at the hotel front desk when the catering office is closed? Would that affect whether you properly tendered delivery? Explain.

What if the hotel tries to pick up the bouquets at your facility, but claims that the bouquets don't look real enough and rejects them. Who will win the lawsuit when you sue them to pay? Why?

Explanation / Answer

The hotel is likely to win the lawsuit as the contract mentioned delivery of the product before noon. The condition to deliver the product by the said time has not been met.

Moreover, there is no way to verify the claims of the delivery driver that the catering office and banquet room weren't open. Also, the owner of the 3D printing business could have tried speaking to the hotel authorities on call and explain the situation immediately. The owner did nothing of that sort and instead chose to leave a message. Alternatively, if the business owner had spoken to the hotel authorities on call, the hotel might have suggested alternate arrangements for delivery of the order as per their convenience.

Yes, if the hotel was a regular customer and there was a designated spot for delivery in case the catering office was closed , then this problem might not have arised. The business owner would have known what needs to be done if the catering office was closed and by delivering the bouquets at the front desk, they would have successfully completed the delivery.

If the hotel had rejected the bouquets at the time of pickup, then the lawsuit would have been won by the owner of the 3D printing business. This is because, hotel authorities should have verified the look and quality of the product before they signed the contract for the order of bouquets. If the hotel rejects the bouquets at the time of pickup, then the hotel is clearly at fault. Hotel should have signed the order contract only after being completely satisfied with the product.

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