So, here’s the scenario: a customer gets less-than-stellar service, including a condescending lecture about why they don’t serve iced espresso at a local coffee establishment. Said customer writes a scathing blog entry about it, replete with a photo of the obscenity-laced tip he left behind. Coffee establishment responds with a blog entry of its own, but instead of rising above the customer’s lapse in judgment sinks to his level. (And for a local business that’s seen its share of bad press this year thanks to a tax problem in D.C., that was certainly not a smart move.)

The whole ordeal makes the rounds on MetaFilter and Boing Boing; I expect that it’ll make either Consumerist, Not Always Right or both in due time.

My feelings toward the shop in general were always rather tepid, but seeing three sides to this exchange made them — well — murky.

The point is that the barista missed two opportunities here. First, to properly educate the customer on why they wouldn’t serve him an iced espresso; saying something like “that’s not okay” is the wrong response. So is saying “it’s store policy” without further explanation. The other opportunity? To offer an alternative that would be just as satisfactory.

From “Top 5 Reasons Why the Customer is Always Right is Wrong“:
“Fortunately more and more businesses are abandoning ['the customer is always right'] - ironically because it leads to bad customer service.” (via digg)

Target – often pronounced “tar-gay” or “tar-zhay” by some friends of mine with tongue firmly planted in cheek – opened ahead of schedule at the DC USA complex. The store’s arrival in the Nation’s Capital proper was announced a few years ago, and finally opened it’s doors on March 5 – four days earlier than originally announced. Despite their prevalence in the suburbs, big box stores like Target are few and far between when compared to locally-owned mom and pop shops.

Naturally, there is no shortage of blog posts related to the chain’s new location. DCist offered a photo spread of the store the day it opened. [Disclosure: I also write for DCist.] The CityPaper’s City Desk blog seemed to obsess over various aspects about the store for several days before obsessing over the soon-to-be-former governor of New York, Elliot Spitzer. And Prince of Petworth unwittingly helped spread a rumor about crime at the new Target. (Crime in D.C.?! I’m shocked!)

Brian offered his self-professed obligatory post on the new Target, and I found this tidbit worth commenting on:

[... I]t looked like they had staff taking care of cleaning duties as well as random stock, nearly every employee I passed asked if they could help me find anything and about 50% of those said good morning and asked how I was doing. It was an interesting slap in the face to the typical DC brand of customer service, so it makes me think that they’ve been cracking down to make sure customers want to come back.

I hope that’s really the case, but the cynic retail employee in me says otherwise.

It’s been my experience that when a chain business opens a new location, the opening staff is just that – there for the opening. A good chunk of the employees are often new hires from the local area, but often there will be a portion of experienced and passionate staff (Sometimes a little too passionate.) there to train the newbies to follow in their footsteps. They come from all levels, from the lowliest grunts to the highest executives.

This was a common practice for an entertainment chain I once worked for many years ago. Flyers were posted in the back of the house to announce new location openings and ask team members to sign up to be part of the “opening team.” Those who were picked went out to the new location for a month to help set things up and train new hires.

When Vapiano opened it’s first D.C. location, nearly everyone I encountered there had a German accent. They were obviously not local; now, just about everyone who works there is. (Vapiano is a German-owned Italian restaurant.) I went to the Cici’s Pizza location in Rockville not long after it opened, and the counter staff was remarkably cheerful. They shouted, “Welcome to Cici’s!” whenever someone entered. That doesn’t happen so much anymore.

Good customer service is a rarity these days. Perhaps Brian’s experience at the new Target will be the norm for years to come. Only then will it truly be a slap in the face to the typical D.C. brand of customer service. It’s one thing to get the ball rolling; it’s another to keep it from stopping.

Last week I mentioned that pxPipe took its service offline. (see PxPipe Goes Down the Tubes) I dropped a note to alwaysBETA. Sean from aB promptly responsed (This is a gesture I always appreciate, by the way.):

All of the aBers with iPhones are now uploading directly from their phones to [Facebook] via email with no problems.

I can’t speak for the others, but I have my phone configured with my gMail address and it still works…

If you’re having issues, you should email Facebook support and ask them what’s up. At any rate, their upload method now works for us and is better than pxPipe was since it tags photos specially as “mobile uploads” with a little icon and puts them into your profile and albums without the need for approval. It just wasn’t worth it for us to maintain our service anymore since we don’t need to use it anymore.

Fair enough, and I should have contacted Facebook to begin with. A snippet from “Sam from Facebook’s” response:

Please try sending the email message with the mobile photo to your
special email address: y——–fbookpix.com. [ed. note: address altered for security]

If you still are not receiving a confirmation code, please let me know.

Now, I had tried that earlier, but to no avail. Because I’m insane, I tried it again.

Wouldn’t you know? It worked! I guess Sam (or someone just as important) made a tweak and I could email photos from my iPhone to my Facebook account. The results are a little inconsistent, though. Sometimes a photo shows up in my account right away, others it takes a day or so. No matter — the system works and I ain’t rockin’ the boat no further.

Sean and Sam were responsive and helpful to my needs. Who says customer service is dead?