Bad service, unanswered e-mail, and who is typically to blame
Me. That answer your questions? Didn't figure, but it's a start.
Just as an addendum to
Rob's post earlier today, I, as the other
half of ThreadBear would like to point out what
I see.
We do deeply appreciate our clientele, and while we do have volume
overloads on some things, I believe that in large part the straightforward
I'd-like-two-of-this-and-fourteen-of-this-other-thing-and-that-other-pattern orders
are typically answered, verified, and shipped within a couple of business days (which
for Rob basically means pretty much any time day or night).
I do know for a fact that Rob is up with the dogs at the crack of dawn
every day rain or shine, weekends and holidays, answering e-mails, taking calls, and
generally running himself ragged (though he'd be the last person to ever admit that
it's anything but normal). I also know for a fact that he hasn't taken a day off since
New Year's Day, and while I don't think he knows that I know, I'm reasonably
certain that he did send out a few e-mails then. We typically say that we took Easter
off, too, but truth be told, he ran several orders that day, too; we just didn't open the
doors to foot traffic.
Does that excuse poor service? Nope. That simple. We both hate that
our trevails with zoning, relocation, and full-time help have put us behind, but neither
of us wants to turn away business, either. I can't imagine saying here (online) or
in-person, "I'm
sorry, but I'm too busy to take your order." So what do we do? We continue to
accept orders, and the time it takes us to get back to everyone increases. Some people
do wind up going elsewhere, and from my own perspective, I certainly can't blame them.
If the situation were reversed, I'd look elsewhere. But there is also the fact that if
all of this were happening somewhere other than the Internet, it would go something
like this... I, John Q. Public, would walk up to the doors of a shop that was packed
with people. I'd see the line and understand that this place is swamped. I like the
proprietors and enjoy the service they offer, but I'd have to levy my available time
to wait with how much I wanted to do business with this particular shop. I might be
willing to wait, and when I did get the service that I expected once someone was able
to help me, I'd probably be pleased with the results and walk away knowing that if I
needed the expertise in the future, I'd again have to make the decision of whether
to put up with the wait for the kind of service that I do enjoy when I can get it.
Do I expect everyone to wait? Lord, no.
Do I think that this can go on indefinitely without negative repercussions?
If I did, would I have been breaking my neck to try to get us into a better position to
better serve our customers? No, I'd let things go on the way they have been, but that's
not what we've been doing. We really have been fighting tooth-and-nail
to get set up in a larger space with better-equipped, more consistently available help
for over six months.
sidebar
Please, never let it be said that we have
not had excellent part time help
in Columbus, Indiana. We had several folks help out at different times who put forth
tremendous effort on our behalf, and we're very grateful for their time and energy.
The issue has been and remains that we need more help than we have had available,
and we have several highly qualified folks who have extended offers to come to work
for us in Michigan. It absolutely doesn't hurt that most of those people also have
experience working in the industry, so it gives us the opportunity to immediately turn
over operation of the shop in large part to them so that we can focus on relieving the
bottleneck that we've had with mail orders.
/sidebar
To return to the issue at hand, though, we have, as several people have
pointed out, grown extremely quickly, and it's hard to be disappointed with that. However,
it is precisely that growth that has created many of the problems. We genuinely had no
idea that our products and services would be in such tremendous demand. We
really had no remote idea that we would
ever become so popular so quickly. Are we pleased? Of course, we're pleased, but we're
also very well aware that we are not equipped to handle the huge influx of orders.
Are we working to ameliorate that situation? I think the answer is pretty self-evident, but
I'll spell it out just to make sure that nothing is misunderstood.
I, as one of the two owners and only employees of ThreadBear
Fiber Arts Studio, have spent a large percentage of my time trying to secure larger, more
appropriate retail space for our shop as well as a home nearby so that we can continue
to operate our business. That leaves one person to handle all orders until we
have completed our move. At that time, our new staff will be able to help us get orders
completed, and I will, as our business' sole web developer be able to put more of our
yarns, prices, and general information online so that the bulk of simple questions can
be answered online without having to send e-mails that may sit unanswered because
we're currently working as quickly as we can to get orders out the door to those people
who know exactly what they want in what quantities they want.
Is this less than ideal? Sure it is.
As unfortunate as that may be, is it reality? Sadly, yes, it is, and no one
hates it any more than we do.
posted by Matt at