How hard is it really to mix friends with business?

Today at work my buyer had a lunch meeting with a vendor.

The vendor represented a line of products that have recently been performing very poorly in sales. She arranged this meeting in hopes of working with my buyer to increase current sales as well as selling her more jewelry from their product line.

An hour later, not only did this vendor treat our office to lunch, she ended up not selling anything at all, and was told Foley's may have to cut the line entirely from their stores. Of course, all this was said very very cordially, but the vendor practically left in tears. I had heard her during the conversation mentioning something about not wanting to lose her job.

After she left, my buyer was talking to the rest of us (her assistant buyers and I) and revealed she and this vendor rep were actually good friends. I was so surprised; their relationship had seemed totally business related until now. Turns out they even hang out on the weekends, and their kids play together - this woman used to work at Foley's.

This made me thinking of how fine a line it is between business and pleasure. The politics of the business world is complicated enough as it is without throwing friends and their feelings and your relationship with each other into the mix.

I guess learning where that line lays just takes experience...