A Fortuitous Meeting with a Picture Book Client

I gave a presentation this afternoon to a local bank who is looking at expanding their service for their corporate clients with PayEasy online payments. We were greeted by our contact from their product development group and he introduced us to a lady from their Sales group who looked really familiar to me. I kept thinking where I saw her before -- she kinda looked like the Korean girl who lives in our condo. I thought maybe she just reminded me for her.

Anyway, when we sat down around the meeting table, we exchanged business cards. I read her name on the card and nothing still clicked. But after a few seconds while setting up our laptop, it just snapped to me -- I've seen her photos several times already before while laying out the full-spread photo book ordered by her husband through ThePictureShop!

Her husband has previously ordered 3 x full-spread picturebooks from us with photos from their various family vacation trips (the 2 prior orders were still our old DIY full-spread picturebook, while the 3rd one was the new format already). The photos were mainly of her and the kids, and since I did the layouts of about 2 of the picturebooks, I had a good recollection of their faces. Strangely, if her husband were to stand in front of me, I probably would not recognize him as he seldom appears on the photo books (since he's the guy behind the lens).

I thought the whole experience was really strange and surreal (but a pleasant one nonetheless). I've always wondered if one of these days, I'll be walking down the street or around the mall and I would actually bump into someone whom I would recognize through their picture book. And it has finally happened today! With 80+ million people in the Philippines, the likelihood of meeting someone whom I have previously seen through their photo book order alone -- and would actually recognize them -- must be very, very slim indeed.