Sunday, April 5, 2009

How To Lose Customers

Mark and I experience horrible service this weekend. Two different types of service, as one place. We like to keep it simple.

We have been meeting with photographers for the wedding, and had made an appointment with a local woman to review her albums. We were supposed to meet her at Hina's Tea today. We arrived about 10 minutes early and decided to go ahead and order.

The woman behind the counter was very short and had a little bit of an attitude. We ordered smoothies (one peach, one mango) and told her they were for "here" since we had planned to meet the photographer. After looking around and realizing that there was really no place to sit, and that we might have to move our meeting to another location, I asked her to change the order to "to go." She YELLED into the backroom - "make them to go!"

Um, thanks.

A few minutes later, our smoothies were in fact in to go cups and being handed to us. However, one of them was only 3/4 of the way full, and the guy said, "I don't remember which one is which" Uh, what? So, being that the general rule for french fries is that the boy usually gets like 5 fries, and the girl gets half a plate, I assumed the full one was mine. And in fact, it was. Yeah me!

We waited a little longer, and didn't see the photographer. We did see a woman that had a bag that we thought might be a photographer...being that one of the others we met with had a similar (not good) look.

We took a short walk, where Mark said, "it's probably that lady with the bag" and I said, "uh, would it be horrible if I said, "if it is her, I want to go home NOW?!" But we decided to go back to the tea house. We stalked the strange woman. She didn't talk to us, and pulled out her homework (whew!)

So, we ended up leaving.

Later, I received an email from the photographer that said, "I hope you're having a nice Sunday afternoon. Our appointment today didn't end up on my calendar, do you have time to meet next week? My treat."

Um, no. Just no. Seriously? Oops, your wedding didn't end up on my calendar! sorry!

(in my defense the woman was wearing a top that did not fully reach the top of her jeans and her belly was hanging out - and while I think my friends would enjoy having someone to mock, I didn't want her distracting the beauty of the day.)

To my bridesmaids: Sorry!
To the rest of the wedding guests: You're welcome.

6 comments:

Mrs. F said...

Oh MY Gawd! How ridiculously unprofessional! Did you find her through the pennysaver or something? :)

My smoothy was too sweet! said...

And Aimee's was too.

Miss Yvonne said...

I am a photographer and I would NEVER treat a potential client that way...so unprofessional!

Carrie said...

Some times I feel like I complain more and more. Are people getting worse or am I getting crankier?

Julie said...

Was the Smoothie good at least?

audrey said...

I can't believe that photographer! I would have responded the exact same way as you. Sorry, but when it comes to wedding planning, being able to stick to a schedule is essential.