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Of all fast food restaurants the one I dislike the least is Burger King. The Whopper is a guilty pleasure of mine from time to time and their breakfast menu blows all other fast food joints out of the deep fryer. Additionally the folks at Crispin Porter + Bogusky in Miami do an amazing job of promoting the Burger King brand. However I must tell you that of all the fast food restaurants Burger King by and large has the worst customer service. It’s not even close. The story below is case and point.
I pulled up to a local Burger King drive thru hungry for a quick fix of a Whopper and the smiling face of the King. As I approached the lighted drive thru menu I fully expected to have to tell the operator I needed a few moments to decide. That moment never came and after I did the cliché “Hello” yell into the menu, I figured it was broken and pulled up to the window. Nobody was there, no movement, nothing.
Finally after a few moments I see a Burger King employee, Carla with a cell phone glued to her ear, round a corner and head for the window. Carla opens the window and just looks at me. I ask are you open? She nods. Well then can I order? Cell phone still attached Carla said “Yeah can you pull back around and order from the menu?” I asked Carla if I could just order from the window and after she completed a sentence to whoever she was talking to on the phone asked “Whatchu want?”
After I got my food and headed home I reflected on what had just taken place. In the grand scheme of things it was no big deal. I got my food and although Carla never got off the phone at any time, my expectations of customer service at fast food restaurants is never very high. Maybe Burger King has discovered that one way to lower costs is to hire any and everybody regardless of skill sets to handout sandwiches. They figure the perception of Burger King employees is so low as it is that no one would be able to tell the difference between a good and bad experience. Will I go back to Burger King? Sure. And Burger King would probably count me as a returning satisfied customer.
While I will no doubt return to Burger King, I was in no way satisfied. I began to think about how long I would have a job if I treated a few of our clients the way Carla treats her customers. Good thing for me and Catch Your Limit that will never happen.
When I was a caddie growing up my fellow caddies would tease me because I would speak up and say that I actually CARED about what the members thought about me and the job I did. As a result I made a lot more money than they did and their teasing stopped.
There are a lot of companies out there doing it the right way. I’d like to think we are one of them but we’ll let our world tell us if we are doing it right. Burger King can sacrifice a lot of customers to customer service complaints. We consequently can’t lose ANY.
I shared this story with the team and my only advice was: Don’t be a Carla!
I pulled up to a local Burger King drive thru hungry for a quick fix of a Whopper and the smiling face of the King. As I approached the lighted drive thru menu I fully expected to have to tell the operator I needed a few moments to decide. That moment never came and after I did the cliché “Hello” yell into the menu, I figured it was broken and pulled up to the window. Nobody was there, no movement, nothing.
Finally after a few moments I see a Burger King employee, Carla with a cell phone glued to her ear, round a corner and head for the window. Carla opens the window and just looks at me. I ask are you open? She nods. Well then can I order? Cell phone still attached Carla said “Yeah can you pull back around and order from the menu?” I asked Carla if I could just order from the window and after she completed a sentence to whoever she was talking to on the phone asked “Whatchu want?”
After I got my food and headed home I reflected on what had just taken place. In the grand scheme of things it was no big deal. I got my food and although Carla never got off the phone at any time, my expectations of customer service at fast food restaurants is never very high. Maybe Burger King has discovered that one way to lower costs is to hire any and everybody regardless of skill sets to handout sandwiches. They figure the perception of Burger King employees is so low as it is that no one would be able to tell the difference between a good and bad experience. Will I go back to Burger King? Sure. And Burger King would probably count me as a returning satisfied customer.
While I will no doubt return to Burger King, I was in no way satisfied. I began to think about how long I would have a job if I treated a few of our clients the way Carla treats her customers. Good thing for me and Catch Your Limit that will never happen.
When I was a caddie growing up my fellow caddies would tease me because I would speak up and say that I actually CARED about what the members thought about me and the job I did. As a result I made a lot more money than they did and their teasing stopped.
There are a lot of companies out there doing it the right way. I’d like to think we are one of them but we’ll let our world tell us if we are doing it right. Burger King can sacrifice a lot of customers to customer service complaints. We consequently can’t lose ANY.
I shared this story with the team and my only advice was: Don’t be a Carla!
