200 Calories (lower nutritional value with insult)

My darling husband is standing in front of a pastry counter late at night in the Neighborhood Wallyworld and side-glances at the equally exasperated guy next to him.

"Weren't you just behind me at the Krispy Kreme?" the guy says to him.

"Yea, quite an experience, wasn't it?"

"Yep."

Silence while both resume forlorn contemplation of the depleted array of 18-hour-old donuts.

I heard about this exchange after Michael returned to the car with what we had to settle for as our treat after several hours of sanding away at the 50+ years of paint on the kitchen cabinets in my late parents’ house. It's a miracle that the walls there never met since additional coats of paint were regularly reapplied to these cabinets but none were ever removed. (The fact that we've struck wood after a couple of weeks' work is a surprise and relief to us both.) We're renovating now, and when you go through that many layers of white-yellow-white-cream-orange-white-etc., it doesn't matter how evolved you are, you need treats.

So Michael offered me Krispy Kreme. My hero.

I can remember when Krispy Kreme first opened in Arlington, and there were lines blocking traffic on South Cooper. The donuts were hot. The personnel delivered service with a smile and a retro flair true to their calorific roots. Families stood in line to watch the donuts sizzle and glide through the deep fat and the white curtain of sugar glaze. The whole thing was an EXPERIENCE.

While we'd gotten over the newness, the treat quotient to the donut itself hadn't faded, so we headed there in spite of the hour to recapture that experience of friendly service and the self-indulgent sugar rush. We were putting down our money to buy that pat on the head that said we'd done well. We pulled up to the window and smiled at one another. Nothing. We waited, wiping the paint dust off our faces in anticipation. Nothing. Michael tapped gingerly on the take-out window. There was a pause, then a young woman walked to the window, opened it, and said the following:

"We got nothing. NOTHING."

Window slams shut.

Could you just weep?

You may remember along with me the little fiasco of publicity surrounding the Krispy Kreme expansion and stock price droop in the face of Atkins diet mania awhile back. The company rallied to defend their brand, but surely, nobody thinks there's a lot of positive to be said about donuts in terms of nutritional value, in spite of the fact that they publish it these days (http://www.krispykreme.com/nutri.html), so what do they think they're selling here?

It's the experience, guys, and nobody's looking to have more doors slammed in their faces these days!

I wish that I could report that this is an unusual occurrence, but it would not be true. Too often, companies spend gazillons on advertising then populate their prime advertising space - the people on the front lines of their businesses - with surly, under qualified (and thus unhappy), unsupervised people who don't even know they're in the business of selling. In an economy where you can get your cellphone in any flavor and your clothes from any continent with the click of a mouse, where services of every type come and go faster than their business cards can be printed, it's important to remember that everybody's selling and that it's the experience that brings the customer back to you or convinces them to seek abroad. It won't be hard for them to find an alternative.

I lay this more at the feet of management than anywhere else. After all, they're paid to be the official smart people. As a revered former acquaintance would have said, "If you're going to run the company, then run it."

That means paying attention, day by day, to the experience you're responsible for providing. Whether you're a large operation or a solopreneur, your customer needs to be able to rely on the fact that interacting with you is going to be a great thing. They need to have a consistent sense that they can go to you to get the smile back on their face.

Or they'll look elsewhere.

Does That Vacuum Work?

Life has an interesting way of teaching the lessons you need whenever you are ready for them. Recently I was reminded of how much I really enjoy selling in the most unlikely of places, my first ever yard sale. (It's hard to believe it's the first one I've ever done after over 5 decades on this planet!)

Vicki and I laughed for a week at what we were willing to do to get people to get stuff we didn't want into their cars and to pay for the privilege. We were cross-selling, up-selling, asking questions, holding back in silence as the customer pondered. We displayed old irons and chipped pottery like they were classic Lalique vases, taking care to put them at the most appealing angle. Everyone was greeted with a smile and a "howdy" to encourage them to stay! (My friend Ross reminds me that if you want to sell someone a car from your lot, you've gotta keep them on the lot.) Same for yard sales - the longer they stay, the more likely they are to leave with your unwanted stuff in the trunk of their car.

Since we didn't really know anything about the whole yard sale process, we did some research before we "opened shop." One of the best pieces of advice we found - and one that moved a lot of items into those trunks and a few into the trash - was to have an extension cord hooked up and ready so that when people wondered if something worked they could put it to the test right then and there. There was no possibility of disappointment. We encouraged everyone to "plug it in first - we want you to be happy."

Today V forwarded the following little gem to me from Kovel's Komments:

The Jazz Bowl Designer's Secret

Viktor Schreckengost, who designed the famous Jazz Bowl for Cowan Pottery, told us that when he was asked to design a folding metal chair for Murray Ohio Manufacturing Co., he had difficulty creating a comfortable seat. He turned a barrel over to make a stool, “padded” it with soft clay, and covered it with plastic. Then he put it near the cafeteria and offered a free cup of coffee to anyone who sat on it. Four hundred twenty-eight “sittings” later he had a contoured clay shape curved to be comfortable for the average bottom. He used it as a mold for the metal chair that became a best seller.

Kovels Komments November 23, 2006
http://www.kovels.com/issues/newsflash/1_16/

Here is one of those wonderful success clues we hear about!

Schreckengost didn't know how to make the chair work so he went to the "end" users for literal "input." This is such a great example of practical research.

Remember this the next time you are about to complain that something isn't quite right. This designer invested in 428 cups of coffee to get the right input.

You can use the same approach to just about anything. Do you wonder if you "audio logo" is effective; do you want to know how to improve it? Just try it out four hundred times. Want to find out how well your tag line works? Yep, you gotta take it to the marketplace and find out.

Too often we try to do things in a vacuum and hope we can get it all perfectly right the first time. Most often the real world simply does not work that way. We have to test and tweak. Then test and tweak some more.

The closing point is really simple this week:

Stop Trying To Work In A Vacuum!

No matter how brilliant you are, the faster you can get real input from your marketplace the more likely you will have a real winner (or know you are backing the wrong horse).

Hilarious Example of Why to Do Marketing Research

You can learn from anything if you are paying attention: this just in from The Muse (aka Vicki) from a Food TV program, Food Finds I think. (I may have a couple of details off but the big picture is accurate.)

There's a restaurant/bar in Norfolk, VA. that is near an Air Force base. Since there are frequent fly-overs, which are quite loud, they decided to use the situation to their advantage. The idea was to have a night when there would be a drink special whenever a fly-over occurred. Sounds like a great marketing idea, huh?

What they didn't know was that on the night in question the airbase was having maneuvers. Almost never-ending fly-overs! They sold a lot of drinks that night. (I'm falling down laughing at the image of the poor bar-keep trying to keep up with the demand.) Didn't make much money but wow, what a story!!