today i went to pick up a few hundred dollars worth of middle-eastern pastry
at the indian food place id ordered the pastry from several days ago
after ordering the pastry
and calling back to confirm the time and day to pick up the pastry
i arrived as scheduled at 4:00 with a van waiting outside and a kind young man
named Jan (thanks jan) ready to help me
but the indian guy took one look at me and then, and only then
called up his baker to cuss him out for not delivering the pastry
no pastry
so what did he do?
apologize?
say he will deliver to me asap?
say he will give me something for free?
no he said
i had to come back
and try later
or tomorrow
and he would not deliver
take it or leave it
i left it
and promptly marched
over to the smaller
not very popular
not written about in the press
indian food place
who were thrilled to meet me
and thrilled to deliver
and even smiled
and said thank you
the moral of this story
is
if someone is plunking down a few hundred bucks in your (*&%^%%#$# store be nice to them!
but you know what
theres really very little of that old fashioned
common sense
professional behavior these days
i see astounding things all the time
the customer is always right?
forgetaboutit
in one restaurant
that i had the misfortune to eat at
a cockroach crawled up the wall behind me
horriried i called the manager over
did he
comp my meal?
beg for mercy?
no
he said
something to the effect of
well you know the exterminator was here
so they all run out
how very comforting
not that i could eat anything in that place ever again anyway
honeys believe it or not i have had clients with little gripes over the years
and yes dears their gripes are mostly un-reasonable
and not my fault
like the client who was mad at me because a heat wave blew in
on the day of her event and i somehow should have known
it was going to be 98 degrees in early june
or the time the client who left the top of their wedding cake behind
and forgot about it
so the party space threw it away
was mad at me because i should have
called them up at 2 in the am in their hotel room while they were making love
and said hey did you forget any cake?
but in those cases dears what did i do?
did i say screw off its not my fault?
no
i said how sad
let me give you something to make you feel better
and then gave them something
a free miniature cake
a bottle of champagne
a hug
whatever
end result
they love me
end result
i will never go into that mean little nasty mo fo indian guys place again
and the new guy will be selling me a fortune in baklavah from now on!
old fashioned business ethics
would sure like to see more of em
