Sorry, We Are Closing…

Have you all ever had an experience of going to the shop, only to be disappointed because it has closed? I think that is very common to all of us. And to me, I am particularly sensitive towards business behavior towards customers because I simply enjoy the process of a business system from ground up. This particular experience made me felt really lousy, and I have really thought of not going back to that shop anymore. Here’s what happen.

By the way, I am a full-time internet marketing executive, and I was working late at HarbourFront Tower on 23rd June 2008. I felt my hair was quite long and messy, so I went to VivoCity hoping to have a quick SGD$10 haircut at QB House. I rushed all the way to VivoCity, and I can tell you that I was really glad to see from a distance that the hairstylists are still there at 9.50pm. Probably I was really late for the haircut. I ran there, and saw one of the employees was just about to turn the shop sign to “We Are Closed”. I went to ask the hairstylist for a quick haircut, she hesitated for quite a while as the other hairstylist showed a crossed hand indicating to her that they have closed. This hairstylist then replied that “We are closed”. I was looking at the other hairstylist for a while, and then looking at my watch. It was 9.50pm.

Please take a good look at this snapshot I got from QB House website…

Ok, I don’t know what time they are closing actually. But it can’t be at the odd hour of 9.50pm. Or unless they are working overtime since 9.30pm or even 9pm. The correct answer from the website shows that they are closed at 10pm.

What I am trying to show you is the power of internet marketing which is so personnal, it can be done at the consumer level! So many companies out there have been spending so much money on marketing themselves, and they thought the minority of complaints wouldn’t be able to spread. I am sorry to tell these companies that the social media networks are growing in strength and there are numerous of them! Most of the big companies even chose to be “blind” and “deaf” about all these things.

All these things are going to change in the very near future… And because of the advanced level of marketing today which is made so simple and easy, products and services will simply become better and better as the lousy ones are going to be closing forever.

I am not really trying to prove who is right or wrong. I could be in the wrong too because they may have a system of closing at 9.50pm and ready to go by 10pm? I don’t know anyway. Anyway, they should not have over-promised their timing. Maybe it’s just those two hairstylists being tired and not wanting to make more money since work can never be completed. Probably I may send a email to them to find out more.

Subway came to the RESCUE!
On the other hand, I wish to thank Subway for staying operational after 10pm because I was so hungry at that time after getting myself angry with QB House. I went to their restaurant, and took Subway Melt meal. Actually, they are closing already when I was reaching there. It happens exactly the same situation as QB House. However, I went ahead and ask politely for a meal. The auntie looked really nice enough and tell me what meal I want, and even told me that they are left with Italian and wheat bread. My heart really melted by her words… What makes me even felt good is that there is no cookies for me to choose from, but the guy offered to went behind to his inventory to fetch me my choices of cookies…

And because of me, the queue for Subway food starts to form up even though they have closed.

I was wondering how they are dealing with the queue, so I stayed quietly at the side to see. I was shocked to see that they are still trying to cater to the queue! It was until there wasn’t anybody queuing that they start to do cleaning up, and that’s when they couldn’t cater anymore. Great service!

I can understand that this is probably happening more on the personal basis by the employees, and it might not be happening in other Subway restaurants. However, this kind of little service can be viral. “Pssst! Subway should be still serving food right now. Let’s go there!” Ok, it might not be a good thing for the tiring employees who worked the whole day. By working an additional 20 minutes, Subway could actually think of diverting their advertising budget towards their employees’ pocket! But it is definitely worthed it since it is gaining exposure by making the customers to spread for them. Isn’t that Win-Win situation where Subway makes a little more money while the customers are helping to spread the Subway brand as a whole? Many companies have been spending millions of dollars just to maintain the people to talk about their series of advertisement!