Service Untitled

The other day I was at the Tumi store in my local mall. Tumi is a company that makes some fairly high end luggage. Their products are quite nice and I wanted to get a backpack for a friend who travels a lot. He killed his last backpack (not sure of the brand) and needs a new one.

I went into the store and was almost immediately said hi to and asked how I was by an employee. She asked if she could me and I explained that I was looking for a backpack. She asked who it was for and I explained what I thought my friend needed.

The lady thought for a second and showed me a backpack. It was nice, but a bit too small. I said he probably needed something bigger. She showed me another backpack, this one quite a bit larger, in the rear of the story. As I was looking at it, she said they had in a few other colors and would take the paper out if I wanted to see the inside.

She went into the back and got the backpack in a gray color. She took the paper out and showed me the inside and explained about the bag’s warranty and such. I liked it and she responded with a joke when I said my friend likely wouldn’t use the pockets (he’s a bit disorganized).

I said I would take the bag and asked if they had gift wrapping. She said she couldn’t gift wrap, but could give me a box and a card for the item. I said that would work. I checked out, she gathered some information about me for their records (name, address, etc.). After that was done, she asked if I had other shopping to do. She offered to hold the item and get everything ready for when I came back.

I came back to the store 20 minutes later or so. She recognized me right away and handed me the box with the card. She thanked me again and I left. Throughout the whole experience, the lady was very nice and very efficient. She was on top of things and obviously not distracted.

If you look at it, the customer service experience didn’t have anything that was that amazing or different in it. However, it is was a series of little things that made the experience a good one, and not just an average retail experience.

Here is what Tumi did right:

• They hired a friendly salesperson. She made the experience from acceptable to great.
• They trained the salesperson well. Though I’m not sure if she was a luggage expert, she knew about Tumi’s product, their policy, how to use the appropiate systems, what was available, etc.
• They make a quality product. The product is an extremely important part of the customer experience. Even if the customer service was great, I don’t think I would buy an inferior product (especially if it is an expensive, inferior product).
• They had enough people working there to deal with the amount of customers in the store. I didn’t have to wait to get helped, and neither did other customers who came in after me. This is very important.

Here is what Tumi could improve upon:

• Have gift wrapping services, especially around the holidays.
• They could have a card or something near the products that show alternative colors, etc. for it.

The main lessons from this: concenrate on finding friendly people to work for you, and ensure there are enough friendly people so customers do not have to wait. Pretty simple, isn’t it?