M is for Money

Lately Mr. M has way too much time on his hands. Hollywood business has been slow and he hasn’t worked in over a month. A few weeks ago while making lunch he became frustrated with the ketchup bottle. The wide mouth design with a center hole meant making a mess, why can’t the hole be closer to the edge he thought. So he called up Heinz to give them his opinion on their packaging.

This is not the sort of thing we do often, but Mr. M really has nothing better to do right now. Plus the few times we have called customer service about a product we’ve always emerged happy. An absolutely terrible carton of ice cream resulted in a coupon for a replacement, but how would a company react to complaints about their ketchup bottle? Surprisingly or not, they were very interested in his opinion. Customer service took the time to talk to him and get his ideas on how to improve the bottle. Afterwards Mr. M was thrilled they took his opinion seriously. But even better, Heinz mailed us some coupons as a thank you. When they arrived we were shocked to find both a coupon for a free bottle of ketchup and coupons for other products they make. Sweet!

I like a company that understands the value of good customer service. We will always remember that Heinz showed us we are valuable consumers and this will affect our ketchup buying in the years to come. All the advertising in the world can’t buy the loyalty they have gained.

For all the consumers out there – speak up! You might not get freebies or coupons, but hopefully you will get a company willing to listen to you. Perhaps you’ll see your ideas put into practice or your favorite product become just a little bit better. In my experience, companies are happy to listen to you, their customer.


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