Good Advice in Tough Times

Here's some free advice to all those desperate retailers: good customer service goes a long way towards retaining business.

I have been working in customer oriented jobs since I was 16 and I have been in charge of training people in customer service for many years. It seems to me that customer service is getting worse just at the time it should be getting better. In my line of work we rely on teachers and group leaders to bring their groups back every year, we count on retaining those sales while making new sales to reach our ever increasing goals each fiscal year. The person taking the reservation needs to make them feel comfortable and happy about their decision. Policies need to be in place to share communication from reservation to tour guide. The tour experience needs to meet the goals of the teacher as explained at the time of reservations and the teacher needs to leave feeling good about the decision to take the kids out of the classroom and into this museum. If not, we lost the customer and the word of mouth can cause a loss of many more customers. I take it seriously and expect other customer service organizations to take it as seriously when I am the customer.

I was lucky enough to get my xmas present from #1 super hubby early this year. We went to pick it out last Saturday. My old laptop was cheap to begin with and fine for when I only used it occasionally but with more use it has become annoyingly slow and I am constantly complaining about it. So we went to Best Buy to get a new laptop. I was so excited and had done some research on what to get and what the prices were like. I knew what I wanted. Mark knows quite a lot about computers so he also was very aware of what I needed and what it would cost. He was also excited to inherit my old laptop and try out some new operating systems that would make it faster and allow him to go online while hanging out with me. We had to go to Best Buy because Circuit City and Comp USA had both gone out of business recently. Best Buy is not known for its customer service and it really showed. One saleslady was very nice, answered some questions but then disappeared. when we were ready there was no one around. I finally found someone and asked about the first lady, since I wanted to make sure she got the commission. When I was told she was on a break and they didn't work on commission I asked this new guy to get us the computer we wanted. Instead of having a pleasant attitude and making us feel good about our rather large purchase he proceeded to act like we were stupid and tried to make us feel small. Is this a new sales pitch I am unaware of? He asked if we knew that this computer doesn't come with any software? I didn't even know what to say because of course it comes with software, what he means is that it doesn't come with Microsoft office which we did know but why say it like that? When we said yes, that's fine he said "So you aren't going to go online at all?" What he meant was that there was no security software so we shouldn't go online without installing something. He wanted to try and bully us into spending several hundreds more on security software. Well, trying to make me feel stupid is not the way to do it. We should not have bought anything from him but like I said, not really any other choice. When we got home we realized that HP does come with security software so not only was he trying to bully us he was actually lying.

This concept of acting superior as a sales strategy is happening more and more. In these tough economic times businesses should be looking for ways to stand out from the crowd and price is not the only way. a policy of good customer service can make a big difference in creating a loyal and repeat customer base. I will try to avoid Best Buy in the future.

Holiday Heap!!!

Awesome craft show tomorrow in Charles Village, We did some holiday shopping there last year and plan to go tomorrow. My favorites from the Charm City Craft Mafia and the Baltimore Esty Street Team will be there. Friends and family have received gifts from:

Cotton Monster

Biggs and Featherbelle

Squidfire

Little Flower Designs

AND I have a beautiful necklace from The Broken Plate

I am currently lusting after items from:

Imogene

Littlest Bean

Bake Sale Designs

Tasha McKelvey

GO TO HOLIDAY HEAP!

Post Election Plans

The election season is over so now I can concentrate on my real life. Of course I am overjoyed that we have President-elect Obama! It's such a good feeling to see my choice win for once! I remember in 2004 I was going to school in NYC and the first school weekend after the election my friend Justin met me in a bar at the Port Authority and we drank and talked about moving to Canada. This is so much better. We are also watching several other issues and have had a mixed bag of success so there is definitely enough to keep me occupied yet. Speaking of politics, check out Mark's new blog for rants on all sorts of topics. Its so much better than having to listen to it in the car on the way to Wegmans every week.

Mark was out of town for Halloween weekend so my "patterns" were out of whack for several days. I was looking forward to being alone for all of the reasons one would be; not having to consult anyone about what you do, what you watch and what you eat. That seemed like it would be really fun. The reality was much worse. I learned that I am much more dependent on having "that one" around than I thought and can't decide if it's a good or bad thing. I talked to the cat more than I should have and lost interest in cooking anything just for me; I had popcorn for dinner on Saturday night. Miss Gimp whined a lot and kept checking the office door to see if Mark was in there but he wasn't so she got sad. We were quite a pair. I did teach myself embroidery with a book I got at the library so I felt like I was accomplishing something. Last Monday night I came home from work, went grocery shopping and finished just in time to pick Mark up at the train station. All is well now.

This weekend I finally sat down and made a list of all of the holiday necessities. Because I still believe in the Handmade pledge I have to plan ahead since it takes time to make things. I have been bookmarking ideas from various craft blogs for months now so it was a matter of narrowing down options and assigning gifts to people on my list. Some gifts will not be handmade for various reasons. Our nephews are old enough to have Amazon wish lists now and I know I always hated getting gifts I didn't pick out when I was a kid so I guess I will break down and buy off the list.

I bought my holiday cards this weekend from Etsy so they are handmade. Cards for me are very deliberate. I like good quality cards and those are pricey so I usually go to places like Papyrus the day after xmas to get them 50% off. I read an article several months ago from Museum Audience Insight and it resonated with me, I too enjoy being the "curator" of my life and making deliberate choices that reflect my style in everything. I usually buy several different style cards and send each style to the person I think will appreciate it the most. That's kinda crazy, true. This year I didn't buy cards at 50% off because we had decided to either go completely paperless or make our own cards but neither happened. So, I was scanning Etsy all this weekend choosing my cards out of the 100's of possibilities. Another reason I am so picky is that we are not religious, not Christian so we try to avoid cards that say Merry Christmas or any religious theme. I choose to celebrate the new year and reserve the time to reflect on my wish for life: peace and happiness. I do believe in sending cards as a way to keep in touch and a nice mini-present to help decorate a friend's home. I love collecting all of the cards I get and stringing them up to decorate.

This blog began as our annual holiday letter last year and now look at it! So, I guess I am coming up on an anniversary of sorts.

Election Day!!!

Yes! Finally Election Day!
I voted after work, no problems and no lines. I did hear of lines throughout Baltimore this morning but I didn't have any problems.

I read some touching voting stories today, the kinds of things that bring home how truly historic this election is. I loved the American Elf strip for today. I also read some great stories on Huffington Post and Andrew Sullivan among others.

Mark and I are watching the TV and the internet for returns. We are enjoying some election night pizza and special OBAMA '08 treats! These treats are peanut butter rice krispie treat pops covered in milk chocolate. The idea came from Kattitudes

If you are interested in obsessing over the maps and the coverage of the returns you can visit

fivethirtyeight.com or talkingpointsmemo.com

If you want to laugh while you obsess, Wonkette is the way to go. We love that site; all night I have been saying "In the Tank!"

Fall

OK so the debates are over (the last one was the best, Tom Brokaw can suck it) and we are in the home stretch of this never ending campaign season. I am cautiously optimistic but I totally agree with Senator Obama when he says don't underestimate the democrats ability to screw things up. So on that note, lets change subjects.

Its fall and that means a time to refresh. Just when you might get sick of the old hot weather routine you get to change things up. It just started getting colder here so I added the blanket to the bed and got out the space heater for another winter where we try to save money on the heat.

Fall at the CSA means lots of squash and green tomatoes. We made fried green tomatoes on Saturday and put out the rest to ripen on the counter in the beautiful new bowl my friend Kristen sent us. The fried green tomatoes were not on my diet but they were really good with a little home made aioli , my special recipe; "let's see if these ingredients taste good together". We also had butternut squash soup last night with left over fried green tomato sandwiches. I have several butternut squash recipes but as usual, my ingredients on hand didn't match so I made it up. I used a little carrot, green onions, some left over coconut milk, thyme, garlic, salt and pepper. It was really good and really felt like fall. Another great fall squash is delicate squash. This was new to us but we got some from theCSA and have cooked several things with it. It's really good and becoming more common in stores so look for it and you won't be disappointed. Vegan Yum Yum just did a post on it. My only complaint is the one pumpkin I got from the farm. I had so many ideas for it, will it be pie, bread, soup, roasted or Halloween jack-o-lantern? Well, it totally rotted out after only 4 days so instead is became trash. Ugh.

Halloween is in the fall and I love that holiday. I love the decorations and the treats and the costumes. The best costumes are hand made of course and Etsy has some great ideas.

Fall also means a wardrobe assessment as summer clothes go to the back of the closet and winter clothes come out. I have to remember what I have and what has worn out. I also have to make sure everything fits, which is why I am now on my fall diet! Last year I went shopping with my mom for fall and we got some great pieces so this year there isn't much to get. This is good considering the economy and my personal finances. Actually, I am surprised Mom was willing to go with me at all, she knows better than anyone that shopping for just a new pair of jeans could take all day and every store must be visited to see all the options. It drives her crazy. Because she is normal. I do need a couple of new things and have started "the research". I am a researcher, its what I do for everything and why I love my job because researching things is totally interesting to me. I have to know everything from every angle before I make decisions. This is also why it is hard for me to shop with other people because I get nervous when they try to encourage me to buy something spur of the moment. I really do get freaked out and I very often regret the purchase when I get home. This is one of the many ways I know I am not completely normal. I start researching fall trends in August with my InStyle magazine and Lucky magazine. Then I look at store websites to see what is in stock. This is when I find several options that would work and start looking at prices. If I think it is too much I will look for a cheaper version or watch the sales. I will try not to pay full price and don't usually shop at the mall. This is because I love clothes but don't have much money, never have. It always makes me laugh when magazines do a bargain spread and their idea of a bargain is Banana Republic instead of Prada. Hello? even on sale I cannot afford Banana Republic. For reals . I shop at discount stores and my new favorite, Kohl's. Kohl's is new to me because I never had one close but now I do. I currently love the new Elle magazine line, almost everything is awesome. I don't love Vera Wang for Kohl's. I had high hopes for that line but its all just weird and looks cheap. If I wanted to bedazzle all of my clothes I could do that myself. But I do not. Ever. Now that I have a list of needs and wants we will see what I can get away with, lets ask The Banker. Wait until he is in a good mood.....

UPDATE: Apparently, Sarah Palin is having a better fall than I am, she got to spend $150,000 on her fall wardrobe!

Debate!

Holy S**t this has been a rough few weeks. Between the credit crisis and the election a person could get very depressed. But Crazy Aunt Purl can help you with that. So the second presidential debate is tonight, in Nashville, at Belmont University. Hey, I know where that is! Things are getting nasty so it should be interesting.

I have become more radical in my old age which actually brings me more or less in line with how I was at 19. The first election I voted in was 1992 as a freshman in college. I was so into politics I covered my car with political bumper stickers and put a Clinton sign in my dorm room. This was no easy decision considering I went to school in southern Missouri. But it also fueled my fire as I was regularly confronted with chalk writings on the campus sidewalks and notes on my car. While I have kept most of those beliefs, I stopped advertising them so much when I joined the workforce. 8 years in Nashville and I learned not to discuss politics at work (or anywhere really), and what to say if people asked you what church you belonged to or if you wanted to go to their church. I had to keep my job and get along. But it made me feel like an outcast in a strange land, Bush country, Big Red. Truthfully, Nashville is a little blue city in a big red state so there were some people who shared my beliefs (mostly they work in education, go figure?). One person I can always count on is Chad Lemons and his little blog HERE.

Well, moving to Baltimore, being close to DC and watching this country lose its way over the past few years has brought back that fire, the desire to slap some bumper stickers on my car (the same car I had in college, even better!) and tune in. As you might have seen on my shared items, I post my favorite news and political blogs daily. Those favorites include: Daily Kos , Wonkette , Mother Jones, Anonymous Liberal, Salon, Andrew Sullivan, Huffington Post and my new favorite, Women Against Sarah Palin . The craft scene hasn't disappointed either. You can see political items for sale onEtsy and Obama Craft Project. Mark has commemorated this election season by joining the ACLU and I have put my money where my politics are by switching my mobile service from AT&T to CREDO mobile. My hobby of crafting and our new interest in local food are also expressions of our politics.

Another great post about surviving the credit crisis by Rebecca Walker is here. As Crazy Aunt Purl says, you don't get your worth from stuff, and you clearly can't afford to anymore. Who needs The Man to tell you what to buy and how much to put on that credit card? Fight The Man and buy, make and give handmade! Also, if the economy completely collapses and we all have to barter with our friends and neighbors, crafting skills come in handy. To make a comfortable cardboard box house.

What I did on my summer (mostly non-)vacation

• The apartment complex decided to close the gym for renovations with no indication of when they would re-open. I took this as a sign to mean that the universe wanted me to spend the summer eating ice-cream and relaxing. This, it turns out, was a poor decision.
• I joined ravelry, the online knitting community and promptly got addicted to all of the forums (Knitting AND Buffy? WHA?) but never actually knitted all summer.
• I joined Burda Style and received favorable feedback from my few summer projects which spurred me to believe I was invincible - until the summer shirt disaster of late July. Patterns, it turns out, are useful.
• One of those sewing projects was a gift for my friend's B-day (July 2) and it's still sitting on my dining room chair with the mailing envelope On Top Of It as if it will magically package and mail itself. Oh Gosh, how cool would that be?
  
• I fell completely over the edge into becoming a total political junkie, recent events of the democratic convention and the Labor Day weekend had me glued to the Internet and the TV. Don't interrupt me.
  
• I took a break from blogging. Don't interrupt me.
  
• I baked A LOT of zucchini bread.
• I cooked closed to 9 pounds of green beans in soups and sautees for every meal.
• My Dad retired!
• My parents moved!
  
• I didn't actually have anything to do with those last two things unless you count the advice on moving a cat. Oh, and collecting all of my childhood memories in boxes in my dining room. I could open my own museum. FYI, my diary from 1989 is really not that interesting.
  
• Successfully avoided the grant writing project I promised to do for the farm. Wanted to kill Mark every Saturday when he said "So, how's the grant writing going?" But, all good things come to an end and the grant is due this month.
  
• Stupid Maryland has a stupid front license plate rule and the F---ing thing fell off! $120 and one police report later, we have new plates. One week after that, the original plate was turned into campus police and then returned to us. So now we have 4 Maryland plates. Too bad we can't sell 2 of them for, oh, I don't know, maybe $120!!!!!!
  
• Went to Florida with the in-laws. This deserves a post on its own. Soon.
• Seethed with anger every week as the parking lot at the train station slowly filled up. People, when you only have 1 minute to walk from your car to the platform, it's harder to do from the back of the lot. Make room. I refuse to get up earlier or spend less time watching the Today Show. Geesh, you'd think gas prices were high or something.
  
• Seethed with anger as said light rail newbies ask stupid questions and nervously press the stop bell. People, it stops AT EVERY STATION. Relax.
• My cat started to refer to us as "peeps." I wish she would stop.