Return of Service

Since Mark was comparing the merits of Europe vs. U.S. for startups, I thought this anecdote might be worth mentioning. Last week I was in the States at my parents’ place in a smallish, extremely rural Connecticut town. (That’s right, despite my finely honed image as a sophisticated urbanite, I’m actually a nature boy.) One of the few exciting things to do in Connecticut is buy clothes, so I headed over to the outlet mall about half an hour away to bargain hunt. After buying an entirely new wardrobe for about $20 (I exaggerate slightly but believe me, outlet malls are where it’s at) I returned home with my purchases.

The next morning, like any good metrosexual I was quivering with excitement to try on my new duds. I slipped on my Brook Brothers linen pants and stepped back to admire myself in the mirror. Instead, my eyes fixed on a small plastic device on the left leg.

“Drat,” I thought. They had forgotten to remove the little anti-theft sensor doo-hickey. My first thought was to wonder how I got out of the store without setting an alarm, but all became clear when I examined the device in question to see how easily I could get it off with the entire firepower of a suburban family’s toolshed at my disposal. Turns out it wasn’t a sensor, but rather an “InkMate” that threatens to spray ink all over the place if you try to remove it. This cooled my inclination to try the do-it-yourself route, and since I was without vehicle and scheduled to leave for the airport in a few hours, I was in a bit of a pickle.

Hot under the collar (and more than a little irritable since I’ve been taking my perennial efforts to quit smoking more seriously over the past couple of weeks), I called up Brook Brothers, ready to read them the riot act. The shop attendant who answered the phone listened to my complaint and passed me to the store manager. Without missing a beat, she took my address and (I kid you not) sent someone out on the hour-long round trip to my parents’ to rid me of my inky nemesis.

Further proof that in the United States, the customer really is king. I can’t for the life of me imagine this happening in any European country. Until snotty Frenchmen and apathetic Czechs cotton on to the importance of not pissing people off, the U.S. will retain its formidable advantage in customer-facing service industries.

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3 Comments »

1. By chance, were you the US guy Mark mentioned in his blog???

   Comment by Mauro — 5/1/2006 @ 7:30 pm

2. To be fair, I mistakenly called Matt an Amercian. He is actually English.

   Comment by Mark Tluszcz — 5/2/2006 @ 3:48 pm

3. you could have added more information on the garments industry of conn. it would have been fun to read that. anyway -your blog was agood read.

   Comment by jSAM — 5/5/2006 @ 2:13 pm

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