The Correlation of Customer Service

Given that starting a business is no easy task but making it profitable along with continuous growth for many years is a whole different equation. No, I am no business owner but dealing with professional business people and learning from them how they maintain their relationship with their customers, taught me some valuable lessons. Something I believe will help me at some point down the line.

Out of the blue I am talking about all these may sound a bit off but I will share my recent interactions and experience with one of the largest travel products and accessories manufacturer in the world as a customer and what I have learned from ethical business point of view.

I am preparing to travel overseas and already started ordering and packing up my stuff ahead of my flight. I only got few more days in my hand. So, I am in a bit of rush. Suddenly I realized, one of the wheel of my luggage is broken. I didn't notice it even when I came back from my last travel only couple of months back.

I reached out to the retailer frantically for spare wheels, they could not help me but advised me to reach out to the luggage repair shop in Manhattan. I spent few hours back and forth without any tangible realistic solution to my issue. So, naturally I reached out to the manufacturer. They requested me to send some information over email which I did happily and they reached out to me within 24 hours with a response that they have the spare wheels for my luggage in stock.

On my email, I mentioned my travel date and requested them if they can ship out the wheels at least a day prior my travel. They assured me that they will send the wheels as fast as they can and I should have my wheel before my travel. Indeed I received the wheels on time. They did not send one, they sent all four of them and I received them few days prior my travel date. They expedited the shipping and the package was delivered within 24 hours since they confirmed me that the head office approved the shipping of the luggage wheels. The cherry on top, they did not charge me a dime for anything. I was able to replace the wheels by myself and my luggage is ready for the travel ahead.

From monetary point of view this may or may not be much but the amount of psychological pressure I was in was astronomical for me. Not having the wheels may have forced me to buy a new luggage altogether instead of fixing the wheels as I do not have much time in hand. I am not ready to spend that much money (it is an expensive luggage for me) for such a good luggage, not at least now. The sigh of relief can not be measured in monetary term. After receiving the wheel, I did send them a mail expressing my gratitude.

The moral of the story is, relationship with the customer simply does not vanish after selling your product. A good business must stand by their customer to support their product and services long after their sales. A good seller and customer relationship can go a long way and I just learned that truth again from my life experience.

What an amazing after sales customer support I received. They do not even know that they just earned a loyal customer and most probably a life long one. No wonder, why the brand is so successful for so long.