Glenn Hilton's Blog

I’ve been going to Tim Hortons for my coffee for years now. I like their coffee (it’s a bit insipid but at least it’s not burnt & bitter like the other spot that sells a cup of coffee for the same price as a small meal). Overall I’ve been quite impressed with my experiences at Timmy’s. For convenience sake, I tend to frequent the ones with drive-thrus and I have to say I’ve been amazed on how fast their service has been. Rarely has there been a time that they haven’t had everything ready for me as soon as I arrive at the window. However despite my glowingly positive experiences at Tim Hortons I wouldn’t be entirely honest if I didn’t admit to one small thing that been grating away at me in regards to their service. And that’s every time I go through the drive-thru to get my coffee, they never put a sleeve on the cup for me. Never. Just to prove my point I decided to shoot a quick video so you could see it for yourself:

Now obviously there’s probably more important things in life to bring to light than the fact that Tim Horton’s doesn’t offer their customers a sleeve on their coffee cups. I’m pretty sure it won’t be the central theme of Michael Moore’s next docu-drama. If you’re a regular customer to Tim’s, doesn’t it just take you a second to ask for one when you’re placing your order and they’ll happily put one on for you? So really, what’s the big deal?

To be honest it’s not a big deal, it’s really just a ‘little’ thing. If you stop and think about it, you realize that somewhere along the line, the top brass at Tim Hortons figured they’d get a little more profit if they train their employees to follow this practice. And we all know that business is all about making money and can’t be fretting about every little thing that clients find grating, right? … Wrong.

Unfortunately businesses who allow themselves to start to think this way will soon find that the little things start adding up in customer’s minds. The seed of malcontent has already been planted and the more it’s fed, the more antsy the customer becomes. And when a competitor comes along who actually addresses those little issues, the customer is far more susceptible to switching loyalties.

Little things do add up. Ideally businesses want to be carefully tapped into their customers and be aware of the common friction points so they can weigh up how significant those derogatory experiences really are for their cliental. And then they need to ask themselves what it may cost them if they don’t make appropriate changes? Are the choices they’ve made to save money leaving a bad taste in their customers mouths? Does it leave them appearing cheap, cold and uncaring?

There is another way they could look at it too. Rather than just focusing on the things that could potentially lose them business, they may want to start to focus on doing things that would give their clients an exemplary experience. To consider the little things that show their clients that they have them in mind and want to be sure they know how much they appreciate the fact they chose to do business with them. Little things like, if they know that hot beverages can be uncomfortable to hold in a thinly lined paper cup, then how much more work would it be to say, “Would you like a sleeve on your cup?”.  Just to go the extra mile and show their customers they care?

So what’s your opinion? Are the little things in business really not a big deal? How many people should complain before a business decides to changes their practices?  At what level should they decide to sacrifice a dollar in order to leave a positive impression on your loyal clients?

Photo by mareina