Restaurant Job Resource - Hospitality Performance Restaurant News

That’s right, you will slip, skip and slide (even skid) as we move further into the recovery. The taste of the upswing has been tantalizing, but the path is still strewn with obstacles and challenges, as we pursue that ascension into economic recovery.

I want it my way, and this is what that looks like. Will this be the next step in the Hospitality evolution? The restaurant sector has played around with this a little – from Wendy’s and to Fuddrucker’s building your own burger. Buffet tables have always been a favorite – no portion control and heaps of your pleasures.

The rest of us in Retail and the service industry have it easy. We say visit our shops, dine with us, spend a night, give us a call, enjoy a round of golf, try this on, watch your favorite team and so on. We have that moment to WOW, a specific short window to make the Experience memorable. We are oriented to the moment - orchestrate the one meal, present the goods, address a particular problem, conduct the tour, etc. We also have the chance to recover from a lapse – a lapse of attention, service, and credibility.

Many in the Hospitality Industry felt they knew everything about the Customer Experience. Even the very definition of Hospitality percolated with terms like care, attention, excitement, relaxation, special, nourishment for the body, soul and spirit – all oriented to that special cachet, which was ours alone. And, others started to borrow on our expertise, particularly with an emphasis on Customer Service. However, we still owned the distinction, and it rang throughout our Brands.

Ego aside, what do you think your reputation is in the marketplace? It really does not matter what you believe; it does matter what everyone else does.

Our Retail world was pretty well whacked in the last two years, and 2010 will be a year of rebuilding our Brands with a new Value Proposition.

My dinner partner this Thanksgiving was my sister-in-law's Mother, a gracious woman of a certain age. She was also one of the first Stewardesses for a major airline, still travels, has a sharp eye for style and substance and is very wise. We naturally talked about Customer Service - then and now.

Business Week magazine in a recent article called Consumer Trust the most perishable of assets. Given the assault on our various Brands and our inability or choice not to respond to this market dynamic, we find ourselves at a loss of credibility in the public eye. We've pretty well shot ourselves in the foot, limping along with the projected economic recovery. We have let our Performance Standards lapse, our staff depart and product quality become minimized. We know the status, and our Customer knows it, as well. There is some rebuilding to do!

We continue to bemoan the obvious - the decline of Service and the devaluation of Product. We are what we say we are. Our Brand is verified by our Consumer, based upon how we delivered on the expectation(s). Their Experience is impacted by what they feel, how all their senses interacted, and how their perceptions turned into reality - the validation process.

Nothing like a world-wide recession to expose our Brand vulnerabilities. Our advantages have been shed, slashed and even trashed. Everything has been discounted to leverage some type of parity and attractiveness.