Retail Insights ‐ Spring 1999

Abstract

One of the things I find most stimulating about customers is how readily they take things for granted. Overnight, today’s innovation becomes tomorrow’s routine ‐ something to be expected. This fact of human behavior is by far the best encouragement I know to pursue a strategy of continuous improvement in service to customers. For example, until recently it was rare for people serving you in a big shop to use your name. Now it is the failure to use your name that is more likely to be noticed. Using the customer’s name when he or she offers a credit or banker’s card has become part of the “given”. The service provider gets no competitive advantage in return for the effort involved.

Citation

Pollitt, D. (1999), "Retail Insights ‐ Spring 1999", International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, Vol. 27 No. 3, pp. 1-16. https://doi.org/10.1108/09590552199900001