As a retailer, I am still very impressed about real and authentic examples of customer experience. As a People expert, a professional who achieves such an impact on me not only impresses me, but it deeply moves me. And I’ve got recently the chance to experience a unique and magic moment of HONEST Customer Experience.
A couple of weeks ago I had a casual meeting in a Starbucks in Barcelona, the city where I live. This cafeteria is in Consell de Cent street, a central location. The premises are usually quite frequented and, even if I am not a regular, I use relatively often this convenient cafeteria for informal appointments. Approximately three years ago, I was served by an extremely nice barista who looked like a musician. His name, according to his tag, was Xose. This time, I was again served by him. I could remember Xose, but I assume it’s more usual for a customer to remember a nice professional than vice versa. Xose smiled at me:
-It’s been a while I haven’t seen you! How are you?
I smiled back thinking that he took me by another person. Xose continued:
-But I see you changed your hair. You used to sport a straight bob with a fringe.
He left me speechless. He was right, that was the way my hair look like three years ago. I asked:
-But, how can you remember this?
Keeping his smile, he shrugged his shoulders:
-Well, I remember my customers.
IMPRESSIVE.
Meanwhile he was processing my order, I asked:
-Since when do you work at Starbucks? I visit this cafeteria since it first opened and I’ve always seen you here.
-I belong to the first batch of employees who opened Starbucks in Spain, 15 years ago. Nowadays there only are 8 of us, but I am the only one who still works in a cafeteria and always at the same one, this one. Connecting with my customers is my passion.
PRICELESS.
And he asked:
-And how often do you visit this cafetería?
-Well, I do not live in the area. But it’s my meeting point when I am nearby.
-Here you have, then. This is a discount card you can use in this Starbucks only. Loyalty must be rewarded.
EXTRAORDINARY.
I must confess that, meanwhile the barista prepared my Cappuccino Freddo, I was so positively impressed about the experience I just lived that I had a knot in my throat. The honest customer experience was not about sales techniques, procedures, respecting specific company steps or an agreed and trained sales ceremony … It was an emotion awaken by pure human tuning. And also awaken by the impressive self-tuning of Xose, that amazing partner who feels, enjoys and finds purpose on his activity. And that is the only way how a real, honest customer experience can be delivered.
I do not have enough words to congratulate Xose and other professional people who, like him, enjoy day by day delivering this true, authentic emotion to the customers they are connecting with. As long as they will be there, the Honest Customer Experience will exist.
