WineryProfitability.com

A winery staff that "owns the problem" increases customer loyalty and retention.

What is the customer service culture at your winery?  How do you winery staff members feel about solving customer problems?  Do your employees own the problem and seek out solutions from beginning to end?  Or if the problem did not start with them, do they tend to pass the buck?  In this article I’ll relay a recent positive experience I had with an employee of a local business and share what I think from my customer perspective were the positive steps he took to ensure I felt good about his company and would therefore keep coming back.

This past November my sister flew in for a holiday visit.  Knowing she likes arts and crafts, I decided to take her to a museum close by where for a small fee the staff lets visitors make art projects.  Christmas was coming up and she thought her project might make a great gift for my parents.

Our day at the museum was great.  We had a lot of fun using our creative side.  We even took pictures of the experience.  My sister thought, “Wow!  Mom is going to love this.  How unique!”  When we were finished with our projects, a staff member came to retrieve them from us.  The projects first had to be fired in a kiln and then either shipped to customers or customers could pick them up at a later date.  To ensure there were no mix ups, the woman also took our ticket stubs with our names on them and lined them up with the projects.

A few days later I returned to pick up the items.  I told my sister I would ship her project directly to my parents.  Excited to see how they both turned out, I immediately un-wrapped them.  “Hmmm,” I thought.  The gift labeled with my sister’s name didn’t seem like the one she made.  When I went back inside, the woman at the front desk explained that it must be the right gift since it lined up with the right name tag.  “Hmmm, I thought again.  Well, I guess Mom is going to get the gift.  It’s just don’t think it’s going to be the one my sister made.”

After speaking with my sister and confirming the project I had was indeed not hers, I decided to give the museum a call.  I relayed my situation with the person on the phone, and she said someone would get back to me.  At this point I honestly didn’t think I had a chance at all in getting the project back.

But this is where the story changes.  Not too much later an employee from the museum’s shipping department called me back.  He apologized profusely for the situation.  He listened to me give my details of what happened.  He said he wanted to do everything he could to see if he could track down the item.  Again he apologized.  He then said he would look at all of other projects that had not been picked up from that day.  He even said if he had to, he would call the other customers from that day that picked up their items to see if they had the wrong gift.  Next he said he would call me back by the end of the day to give me a status update.

Well, the museum employee did in fact call me back that day.  Luckily, another woman left a voicemail to say she had just received her project in the mail, and it was not hers.  The employee called me and excitedly relayed the voicemail and told me that he would call me again when he had reached her to get a better description of the project.  He then explained that once he got a positive description, he would have a box shipped to me.  I was to wrap up the project I had, and he would call UPS to have the box shipped back to him. 

A day later the man called me to say that the project the woman had was indeed my sister’s.  He then took my parents’ address and shipped the project directly to them.  Amazingly my parents got my sister’s gift in time for Christmas!

So what did the employee from the museum do that made me feel so good about him and his company?  Below is a list I put together:

1 – The employee owned the problem

What I found refreshing about this employee was that it didn’t matter who was responsible for the mix up.  He didn’t go into how it happened or name other staff people’s names.  He was just going to own the problem himself and come up with a solution.

2 – The employee sincerely apologized for the mistake

Again, it didn’t matter whose fault it was.  The employee apologized on behalf of the museum.

3 – The employee actively listened to me

The man let me explain my situation without interrupting me.

4 – The employee did what he said he was going to do

He said he was going to call me back by the end of the day, and he in fact did just that.

5 – The employee saw the problem through from start to finish

The man didn’t just discover what was wrong and then pass parts of the solution off to others.  He stuck with the problem himself to ensure I would end the experience with a positive feeling about his company.

6 – The employee had a good plan in place for fixing my problem

He really took charge and explained step by step what he and I should do to get the project to my parents.  His confidence really showed which made me feel like he and the museum were very professional.

What about your winery employees?  Would the members of your staff have acted the same in a similar situation?  Do you have clear policies and procedures set up to handle common problems?  Please share your thoughts in the Comments section above.  Want to contact me directly?  Please email me, Kelly Richards, at info@wineryprofitability.com.