I’m a big fan of Danny Meyer, CEO of Union Square Hospitality Group, author of Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business, and restaurant rock star. He has unique ideas about service in the restaurant industry; in fact, he is specific about the painstaking measures the professionals at all of his restaurants take to provide a premium service experience.
So, the last time my girlfriend and I were in New York, we went to Blue Smoke, Meyer’s upscale barbeque place. One of the things I was excited about came from something I read in his book. He said that when someone makes reservations at one of his restaurants from out of town, the waiter assigned to the table will ask about the diner’s hometown. So, I made reservations…and no one asked about our hometown. And while the food was good, the service was just ok. So, when one of his chains, The Shake Shack, opened in DC in May, my girlfriend and I went to give Meyers and his service stories another try. My burger was good but, again, the service left me wanting more.
These experiences made me think—was Danny Meyer aware that his restaurants and their employees were not delivering on the service promises he was making? And then it made me think about Optimal…we are, first and foremost, a service company. Our website says it, our marketing literature says it; heck, we’ve even won awards for it. But, do our clients experience the truth in our claims? And, how do we know what they are really experiencing? We distribute questionnaires and initiate informal service conversations, but the true test will be when an objective third party surveys our client base to ask if we are delivering on our premium service claims. Will our clients report a disconnect between claim and experience or will Optimal’s perception turn out to be reality? Stay tuned….
What do you think?
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Do you think my girlfriend and I just showed up on an off day—at both restaurants?
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And let me know about a time when what a company claimed didn’t prove to be true for you—or the opposite.
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