Half of economics is missing. Everybody talks about “German efficiency.” They say Germans PRODUCE good products. So much for supply.
But economics is both supply and demand. One British writer said about German food, “Germans expect good food and they expect to pay for it.”
The Soviet Union managed to accomplish a miracle. It existed for over seventy years and never produced one single product that anyone outside its own slave market would want. Its entire focus was production, and anything its insane system produced had to be consumed by Russians who were hungry and standing in line.
Latin American products are lousy because Latin Americans don’t demand more.
The reason you get lousy service today is because no one before you DEMANDED better.
You don’t have to be rude, but you do have to insist.
Part of being a good citizen is being a tough customer.
#1 by Elizabeth on 03/05/2005 - 2:35 pm
I ran a small service business for a close relative for two years or so.
While running this business, I attended a workshop. One of the few really valuable pieces of information was that a dissatisfied customer is much more likely to go out and tell a hundred people about his or her unhappy experience with your business than to tell
anyone at the business who or what made them unhappy.
Anyone with ANY sense who runs a small business will APPRECIATE
being told _calmly_ what they’re doing wrong, so that they can
correct the problem and KEEP your business.