A supermarket in Mombasa. FILE PHOTO | NMG
I promised my long suffering copy editor that I would submit a
piece for Easter Monday given my regrettable absence last week. I was
therefore writing today’s piece on the fly as I’m packing to take a
quick Easter break and chose to borrow slightly from a piece I wrote
nine years ago about magic and miserable customer service moments.
Many
years ago, I walked into a supermarket in Johannesburg’s Rosebank Mall,
and arrived at the till at 5.45 pm with less than five items in my
shopping basket. The shop was due to close in 15 minutes. The cashier
mumbled something unintelligible to me, to which I responded “Pardon?”
Realizing
that I was not a local South African, she repeated her sentence in
stilted English, “Why you give me work to do, when you see it is time
for closing, neh?”
Following which, she reluctantly
processed my five items, all the while clicking her tongue and muttering
under breath words which I’m sure would turn my grey hairs blonde had I
understood them.
Until today, I’m not sure what surprised me more: the fact that
she was unwilling to work 15 minutes before the shop was due to close or
the fact that she actually articulated her displeasure specifically to
me. Miserable moment!
Closer to home in the same year,
I was doing an inordinate amount of shopping in a leading supermarket
in Kenya and my trolley was filled to the brim. The mere thought of
parking it aside and walking several aisles back to get a new trolley
was enough to make me try and pack the overflowing items in a smarter
manner.
One of the shop attendants suddenly appeared
out of the blue with an empty trolley which he rolled to my side. He
promptly took my heaving trolley and told me that he would place it next
to the cashier counters where I would find it when I had completed my
shopping. Magic moment!
Two years later, I went to the
competitor of that leading supermarket. I was about seven months
pregnant and wanted help to get something off the top shelf that was
slightly out of reach.
So I pulled my “pregnancy
privilege” card and stood there, arms akimbo, legs slightly parted while
looking totally helpless. [In case you don’t know it, the pregnancy
privilege card helps one get away with cutting long queues on election
day, being allowed to use the business class toilet on a flight with a
packed economy class or getting a seat in a standing room only event.
It
is a card I, and many of my female gestating colleagues, have used with
ruthless abandon!] I stood. I stood some more. I stood for about five
minutes, but in Greenwich Mean-Pregnancy Time it seems more like an
interminable 30 minutes.
Absolutely no one came. I
then realized that Kenyan supermarket number one had ensured that each
aisle in the supermarket had an aisle attendant.
Someone
who made sure that the shelves were constantly stocked, that any items
picked were quickly replaced with items from the back, and that
customers would have someone to refer to in case of any peculiar
questions like “where can I find that orange black thingy that nani was
using on TV to do nini?”
It had never crossed my mind
that Kenya’s leading supermarket at the time ensured that most customer
touch points consisted of magic moments.
Meanwhile
back at the competitor of the leading supermarket, a random staff member
was three aisles down where I had waddled my way to and found him in a
deep conversation on his mobile phone.
I gesticulated
the universal sign language for “I need help” which is something along
the lines of a raised eyebrow and simultaneous shoulder roll with
outstretched palms. He continued talking on the phone.
I
waddled slowly back to my trolley and gazed thoughtfully at the
contents. I walked away from that miserable moment and from that
miserable supermarket.
Unsurprisingly, it is currently
swimming in a cesspit of financial doldrums. The attitude of that aisle
attendant was a natural reflection of the abject indifference the
leadership had to the customer experience and to longevity of the brand.
The retail industry is one of the key champions of
mystery shopping. Getting an independent person to pose as a genuine
customer and get a real feel of what customers go through is a very
useful exercise in determining whether you are providing magic or
miserable moments.
Your wayward staff will never tell or show you the truth. Only your customers will. Happy Easter!
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