The Customer Is Sometimes Very Wrong
Please, allow me to rant.
Part of the reason I vowed to never work in a restaurant again was that people can be so rude, so unreasonable, so incredibly mean. And it’s hard to just shake it off, although it would often leave me shaking. Like the time the very obnoxious woman sent every course back, starting with perfectly seared foie gras that she refused to pay for and ending with the loud proclamation to another waiter that “Farley learned her lesson tonight.” Oh, I did, but not the one she meant.
Working in the wine industry, I don’t come across jerks nearly as often as I did in restuarants. And it makes sense. Most people who come to a winery are in a good mood—they want to taste and learn and maybe even laugh. I provide all that, as best I can, usually with a smile. Most people appreciate that and let me know.
Then there are those who don’t. Okay, fine. But when someone starts going off on me over something that is out of my control, it takes everything in me to not explode like a bottle of warm champagne. These items include, but are not limited to, the fact that it isn’t legal for us to allow folks to drink wine on the deck out front, that we are not there to get people drunk, the cost of shipping, bottle limits set for certain states, and most recently, that some states which did not previously require sales tax for shipping orders now do. What I do not need, in the middle of an even-busier-than-the usual-Saturday chaos, is for someone to berate me on the phone as if I am trying to intentionally cheat her out of money.
Sometimes I wish that I could tell people what I think without worrying about the consequences. When I was working at a fine dining restaurant during grad school, there was an older couple who would come in several times a week. The woman was a real pickle, all sour and pursed lips, demanding we bring her blue-cheese stuffed olives, not put garlic or salt in anything, etc… and then would barely leave a tip. We all would hope against hope that fate would save us from the Karneses. But with only four waiters on, the odds were against us.
My last week there, I had it all set that I was going to tell them how unsavory they were and how badly they treated us on the off-chance it might make things better for those I left behind. Of course, my last day came and went, and I hadn’t said a word.
But for those of you in customer service, don’t you wish you had a freebie or two? I would love to have carte blanche every once in a while to tell someone to stop being so cheap/pompous/fill in the blank. Or at least to be independently wealthy and not have to worry about the repercussions…
Image source: Russ, the Winehiker
Tags: customer service, mean customers, tasting room tiradesRelated Stories
POSTED IN: tasting room etiquette, wine as it relates to life
4 opinions for The Customer Is Sometimes Very Wrong
Sharon
Jun 8, 2008 at 3:39 pm
I used to manage a clothing store, and there were a few regulars that were very challenging to my patience skills, including one who both shoplifted and intimidated the owner into selling to her at cost… another who would stay at the store for hours on end, demanding to be entertained .. another who would try on half the store and not buy anything, ever… but most of the customers were a pleasure to deal with, but I guess that’s the way it is dealing with the public, there are always those problem customers!
Farley
Jun 9, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Sharon,
I’m glad to know I’m not the only one. It’s usually fine, I just needed to blow off some steam and pay more attention to the people who are really kind.
Gabriella
Jun 10, 2008 at 8:57 am
Oh sister, you are so not the only one. After a decade of working in the service industry, paying my way through both my BA and MA, I can completely relate to your frustrations. Although I have met some of the kindest, most loving people in the world through restaurants, but I have also met some of the most close minded, selfish and condescending.
For example, how about the guy who argued with me for 15 minutes that he wanted lobster, after telling me he doesn’t like seafood. Which was followed a 10 minutes screaming session at me that lobster never comes with a shell, and why did I bring it to him in a shell. And finally ending the night with him storming out of the restaurant, throwing a glass across the room saying that the lobster meat was the most disgusting thing he’s ever seen and that I should have known better to have ever agreed to serve him shellfish in the first place.
I quit all three serving jobs that night and started working in house restoration until I moved to Spain. That said, I was honest a few times, when the moment truly demanded bluntness, but more often, I felt sorry for people like this. Your life is short, and to spend it pushing people away from you through your own fears and frustrations isn’t worth your time. I’ve found that by showering these same people with kindness and patience, more often than not, a ray of sweetness typically shines through.
Farley
Jun 10, 2008 at 9:41 am
Gabriella,
I often feel sorry for them, too. To be that miserable and treat people so terribly for no real reason…
When I have awful service, I don’t even come close to how some of these folks have acted. Okay, there was the one time I cussed out the AOL guy on the phone, but have you ever tried to cancel your service from them? They WILL NOT let you.
Other than that, I always try to be understanding. You never know what’s going on in someone’s world. And that applies to malicious customers, too.
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