Poor service worse then recession
Being unable to see their business through customers’ eyes loses more business than the recession. So says Michael McLaughlin, for twenty-years a business vetting manager for the Guild of Master Craftsmen. The biggest haemorrhage of assets is the loss of goodwill caused by de-motivated staff.
As fast as service providers generate business through imaginative cost effective advertising, they lose it because of poor staff training and management. The average customer can reel off a dozen businesses they no longer frequent because they have been offended by poor customer service. It is the self-inflicted recession that never goes away.
AMERICAN BEST PRACTICE
The chairman of an American car making giant was the first to see the light. He couldn’t understand why Japanese rivals were outselling his company’s equally good products. Delegating members of his staff as make believe customers he sent them to his firm’s dealerships … and to Japanese outlets.
Death wish costas
I watch as Guardia Civil officers enter the lively restaurant whilst ignoring the Chinese sellers of bootleg CDs standing in groups outside. Identifying the eatery’s owner they tell him in no uncertain terms that he must stop the live music or he will be closed down.
The officers’ visit leaves tourists and diners crestfallen. They came to enjoy the sub-tropical atmosphere and entertainment. Shaking their heads in silence they look at each other resignedly as the truth sinks in.
Nothing underscores better the reason why tourists are deserting the Costas in their millions. A festering culture of antipathy towards tourism and la dolce vita Spanish-style has set in. Reason seems to have deserted the policy makers.
A fellow diner says: “If their purpose is to return Benidorm to fishing village status they could hardly do it better. There is no need for eastern Mediterranean resorts to pass the brown envelopes in pursuit of high-spending tourists: the Spanish do it unpaid. They are misguidedly reversing the gains of decades.”