Read Time: 4\u00a0minutes<\/em><\/p>\n Hello<\/p>\n When Zara \u2014 yes, them too \u2014 steals your work<\/a>, one\u2019s gut knee-jerk reaction fulminates resulting in a stubbed toe, concrete wall intact. Try replacing “Zara” with your favourite brand. How does that feel? Fucking sucks, right?\u00a0<\/p>\n Why does our \u2014 a creative professional\u2019s \u2014 heart sink? Because we\u2019re eyeing great brands hoping that one day working with them would put an end to the \u201cCraigslist\u201d addiction (and spec work alike). But sadly, they\u00a0(not all but a few) are no better.\u00a0<\/p>\n “Devils don’t come from hell beneath us. No, they come from the sky.” Welcome to Chapter Eight. The unofficial third part in a series with “What To Expect<\/a>” being the first. \u00a0<\/p>\n For the longest time, I coddled the notion bad clients are bred only in India (and developing countries alike). Having worked and lived in North America and Asia, I can assure you \u2014 like good ones \u2014 bad clients are everywhere. Thank you, Zara.\u00a0<\/p>\n By the way, I’m not trying to pull a Trump on you. Scaring you or pressing on your deepest fears isn\u2019t how I comb my bald head.<\/p>\n So why do \u2014 the likes of Zara \u2014 do it? How are they any better than your average lunch box bully? How do ruthless strong-arm tactics and scaring independent creatives make sense? Considering the hyper socially-connected world we live in.\u00a0<\/p>\n Come on, man! Seriously? You\u2019ve got, like, a gazillion dollars sitting around \u2014 earned by selling <\/em>millennials\u00a0a $150 polo made in Bangladesh, which you cleverly pulled out of an 8-year-old\u2019s ass for a nickel. Doesn\u2019t all the bad press, kicking you in the nuts, hurt?<\/em><\/p>\n I\u2019ve encountered a few snake-oil businesspeople in my career \u2014 I\u2019m sure you have, too. Here\u2019s an account of on one such instance.\u00a0<\/p>\n It happened while working with a family-run business, industrialists known for textile. They, like Zara, produce clothing and sell it across the country under their name labels, and act as an OEM for international brands. This is one<\/em> division of their many businesses.<\/p>\n It all began with VP of Marketing, having heard of our work, contacting the studio. Being the client-facing partner, I took the call and listened to what the man described as an \u201cOPPORTUNITY to get NOTICED!<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n The call had come from out of town. At the time, neck-deep in projects, and lazy to travel, we decided to put the industrialist on hold. But the VP was persistent, \u201cWe want you to do the work! At the least, come and meet us, once!\u201d he said speaking louder than before, into the phone, feeling ignored. \u00a0<\/p>\n I \u2014 new to the business, unknowingly, had been \u2018pushed\u2019 over \u2014 yielded to the man fixing a time and date. Two weeks later we (my partner and me) stepped into a wood panel office adjoining one of their factories.\u00a0<\/p>\n We were greeted by the VP himself and his boss\u2019s son (heir to the loom). They had all the bells and whistle at play. For the first meeting, we had prepared rough ideas, knowing the verbal brief.\u00a0<\/p>\n 3 hours later \u2014 reminiscing in applaud \u2014 a retainer agreement was signed and the copies left, for their \u201clegal\u201d department\u2019s dissection. \u00a0<\/p>\n Over the course of 18 months we helped build an idea into 5 boutique stores\u2014 doing all the branding, advertising and strategy work. This is, about the time, when it began to fall apart.\u00a0<\/p>\n Before one could smell the roses they had meticulously prolonged months of retainer fee \u2014 meeting several polite reminders with dilly-dallying responses. \u00a0<\/p>\n To one day, looking at our bank statement, and with no other option left, I sent out an email freezing all their digital accounts \u2014 chiefly Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and website. In their response, it had become clear, why they deliberately chose us \u2014 they were Goliath; a harsh truth we swallowed. \u00a0<\/p>\n What followed the threat got us into a big fix. They sued us for not paying us. Yes, you read that correct. A morning, not so distant from the email, we received a legal notice, putting in motion their threats. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n As a small business, and new to the game, I panicked. Sitting at my desk late that night, I thought to myself, \u2018I\u2019ve never been to court.\u2019 Worried this could blow up in my face I made a call. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n On the other end was a friend and mentor, a retired lawyer, who patiently took into account the situation. Within two days, we met another practising lawyer for advice.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis amount is nothing! There\u2019s no point in pursuing this. Just give them the details and get out while you can,\u201d the man told us. We walked out of the lawyer’s office feeling small, helpless and frustrated.\u00a0With repercussions of the legal notice looming over our head, we knew something had to be done, and quickly.<\/p>\n In between all this, they managed to hack into our account and take control of their accounts. But, we were quick to our feet and reversed it.\u00a0<\/p>\n How did we, in the end, make it all go away and have them pay us? A connection with a high-ranking government official serving the elected state minister. The man brought us to an equal playing field.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhy are you troubling these boys over an evening liquor bill,\u201d is how he jokingly put it, over the phone as I sat and watched, to the industrialist. Yep, a simple fucking phone call.\u00a0<\/p>\n The next day a man arrived at our studio with full and final payment. We obliged with the login details. At no point, during this entire episode, did we delete or remove their social accounts. We kept it civil despite all the signs pushing us to pull the plug.\u00a0<\/p>\n In the end, it\u2019s what helped end the ugly episode. But wait, it doesn\u2019t end there. Guess what happened 6 months later?\u00a0<\/p>\n Their President called. He played nice and pleaded to hire us. \u201cLet bygones be bygones, Mr Paul,\u201d he said, trying to patch up as if this were an episode of Suits.\u00a0But this time, we were wiser and learned to never return the call.\u00a0<\/p>\n We\u2019ll continue to talk about evil clients this week. In the meantime, I\u2019m leaving you with two fantastic resources.<\/p>\n Clients From Hell<\/a> Before you go<\/strong> Share your views on today’s Chapter either by replying to this email or tweeting<\/a> me. Always happy to improve, learn and answer your questions. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Have an epic week!<\/p>\n Yours truly, Access the\u00a0Locker<\/a> to read any\u00a0Chapter\u00a0or T\u2013S\u2013F<\/a>\u00a0to download 365<\/a> open files. The Locker<\/a>\u00a0&\u00a0T\u2013S\u2013F<\/a>\u00a0are classified and exclusive to squadron only. (Password: <\/em>topgun)<\/em><\/p>\n TWITTER<\/a>\u2014INSTAGRAM<\/a>\u2014MEDIUM<\/a>\u2014OFFICE<\/a>\u2014ELLO<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Paul Syng’s SQUAD \u265b Chapter Eight Zara Steals Too Read Time: 4\u00a0minutes Hello When Zara \u2014 yes, them too \u2014 steals your work, one\u2019s gut knee-jerk reaction fulminates resulting in a stubbed toe, concrete wall intact. Try replacing “Zara” with your favourite brand. How does that feel? Fucking sucks, right?\u00a0 Why does our \u2014 a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"rank_math_title":"","rank_math_description":"","rank_math_canonical_url":"","rank_math_focus_keyword":""},"categories":[91],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-90008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-digest-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90008\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/bdcf6900-8cef-495b-97f4-6d9e583cae41-scaled.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
\u2014Lex Luthor<\/p>\n
Mike Monteiro: F*ck You, Pay Me<\/a><\/p>\n
I encourage you to fill out this\u00a0survey.<\/a>\u00a0Tell me a little bit about yourself, it only takes seventy-two seconds. Your suggestions are appreciated and help me shape and improve the SQUAD.<\/p>\n
Paul Syng<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/paulsyng.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/6524ec05-a550-49b3-8497-d6ca47523b14-scaled.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n