Chocolate: A New Pillar Of Great Customer Service, And How To Win Some

Hello shoppers...

Want to shop happier?

Eat chocolate.

Want to work happier?

Eat chocolate.

Want to own a business with happier shoppers, happier employees, happier everybody?

Serve chocolate.  

Not Tootsie Rolls. Not Smarties. Not Milk Duds or Dum-Dum Pops or Peppermint candies or Circus Marshmallow Peanuts or other rancid rap-kay that companies pile in glass dishes and set out for patrons to "enjoy."

Nope. I'm talking about Chocolate: rich, creamy, sweet, decadent, melt-in-your-gooed-up-mouth shut down your gooed-up arteries keel over with a smile on your chocolate-smeared puss, chocolate.

Why chocolate is the greatest customer service invention in history:

1. It induces a chemical reaction in our brain (nobody knows why) that makes it release natural opiates that give us an overall sense of well-being, roughly equivalent to having an orgasm.

2. Do you really need a #2?

Put huge bowls of chocolate everywhere we shoppers, shop - at checkout counters, customer service counters, bank teller counters, bill-paying kiosks - everywhere.

But not just any ole' chocolate Mr. and Mrs. Willy Wonka, but the most perfectly constructed chocolate treat on God's brown frosting-covered Earth: Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Miniatures.

Got a peanut allergy? You get a peppermint drop, thanks for playing. Don't like peanut butter? I'm having you committed. Worried about the calories/fat/guilt? I eat four Reese's Peanut Butter Cup mini's a day (one about every two hours) and I've lost 75 pounds since January (145 pounds overall). (Read the story by clicking this sentence.)

The day of my life I regret the most? March 12th, 2003: THE DAY I DIDN'T EAT A REESE'S.

All of my Buyosphere clients have Reese's mini cups on their customer counters. I gave away hundreds of Reese's minis over the past four days to customers and employees at several Dahl's Foods stores (also a Buyosphere client) in Des Moines, and you would have thought I was handing out $100 bills; people couldn't stop smiling and thanking me. And that was before they'd put the sweet treat into their watering mouth.

Want some free Reese's? No kiddin around - email me your name, company name and address and I will personally bring a free bag (or two) of Reese's Miniature Peanut Butter Cups to your company location and hand them out to you and your co-workers and your customers. 

Your company, customers, co-workers and you will be reborn.

If you want to toss some mini Kit-Kat's, Snickers, Kisses, Almond Joys and straight-up Hershey bars into the bowl before I get there, and serve them to your customers and co-workers alike, go for it, Easter Bunny.

After all, it was Milton Hershey who, in 1894, started a chocolate-making company that would become a dynasty - in part because Hershey, as one of the most progressive-thinking industrialists of his time, believed in treating his employees with compassion and dignity.

For that reason and a lot of others, it's time to add another pillar to my Five - now Six -Pillars of Great Customer Service:

1. Smile

2. Greet

3. Engage

4. Thank

5. Follow up

6. Serve chocolate

That one's for you, MH. :)

Jonnie Wright is a customer service evaluator and trainer, professional secret shopper, marketing strategist and host of The Unsecret Shopper Radio Show, Saturday mornings 8-9am, on 1350, KRNT.        

Click to be taken to Jonnie's Facebook page     

Click to be taken to Jonnie's Twitter page     

Click to be taken to Jonnie's blog     

Click to email Jonnie (jonnie@thebuyosphere.com)     

Phone: 515-480-4190