The Positive Power of Complaints
Come to think of it, over a marketing career
that has spanned nearly forty years, I haven't complained as often as I
should.
As I write this article, I ask myself: why
have I (most of the time) just taken what life has hurled at me and not
complained? A moment of reflection and analysis reveals that I have
(probably like most Indians) been conditioned to just accept it and move on.
I guess this come from the stoic acceptance
that we Indians are taught from childhood.
If we face bad service at the bank, for
example, or at a government department, we hardly ever complain. We just
seem to accept it as our fate.
The first time I learned that complaining
could be rewarding was in Dubai, many years ago. I was at the Carrefour
hypermarket in Sharjah, when I noticed that many products on the shelf were
past their expiry date. I drew this to the attention of the manager who was
very pleased that I had brought it to his notice; had a Sharjah municipality
inspector noticed it, they would have been severely fined. He took down my
name and contact details and a few days later, I got a call that they had a
gift for me and would I please come by and collect it? It turned out to be a
French Cologne for Men.
On 7th April 2010 I was in Jayanagar 4th
Block when I happened to see the new Maiyya's store across the street. I
walked in and the noticed that they were selling whole wheat bread. I picked
up a loaf and checked the expiry date (9th April). It was premium priced
(about 10% more than most other loaves of competing brands) but Maiyya's are
known for their quality (they are an offshoot of the famous MTR in
Bangalore) so I happily paid the premium.
On 9th April, as I took out a few slices of
bread from the cover I was surprised to see that the bread had developed a
mold and had gone bad. I found the email address of the company on the cover
and shot off a mail to them that read:
I purchased your wheat
bread on 7th. It had a "use by" date on 9th.
However, today (9th) I found that the bread had developed fungus in spite of
properly storing inside a bread basked.
This is certainly not something to be expected from a premium organization
such as yourselves.
For your information, I find SPV atta bread the best in the market. It is
priced at Rs. 22, (cheaper than your bread).
I don't think I will purchase your wheat bread again, but being a marketing
consultant, I thought I should inform you of the poor quality.
The response from the company was immediate.
I got a call from their general manager that their executive would come and
meet me and collect the bread. We agreed that 3 pm on 10th April would be
convenient.
The "executive" turned out to be the Managing
Director's relative, who is in charge of production. he came loaded with the
goodies that you see in the above pic. He spent a considerable amount of
time expressing deep regret at the lapse in quality and assured me that they
would investigate the issue to find out how such a lapse in quality had
occurred. When he left, he had completely erased my negative impression of
the brand.
A few hours later, he was back with more
goodies. "I wanted you to sample these products which we are creating for
export markets" he said as he handed over a packet each of Khara Boondhi,
Chow Chow mixture and Rice Kodaballe (all Karnataka specialities).
I was amazed, to put it mildly.
"I must sit down and blog this" was my
immediate reaction and that's exactly what I did.
What a splendid reaction from the company!
Hats off to Maiya's.
Prakash
Subbarao
10 April 2010
