Business isn’t just about providing the best products or meeting deadlines, it’s more than that. It’s about how we treat our customers. It’s about the way Jigsaw Print builds a professional and friendly relationship, it’s the only way to reward loyalty and it’s the only way we know how to do business.
If we aren’t building genuine relationships with our customers, we aren’t doing business right!
Unexpected problems can arise, it’s what can happen in any business and that can impact customer expectations.
That’s something we don’t want to happen. We never want to let our customers down.
Especially when there are such pressures on the haulage and delivery industry, it can often be taken for granted, but that doesn’t mean things can’t go wrong. Sometimes the haulage and delivery industry can be disrupted by events beyond your control.
Solutions, not excuses
So, what do you do if the promised delivery doesn’t happen on time? What do you do when things go wrong?
The way we see it. You have two options.
- Accept it, which doesn’t help your customer
- You can do something about it
When you have built a relationship with your customer and explain how things have gone wrong, sure, they can be understanding and accept that it isn’t your fault. But it impacts your business and your reputation.
If you fail to deliver, it’s your reputation that’s on the line. It shows you are unreliable.
To us, that just isn’t acceptable.
If we fail to deliver, we have let our customer down, simple as!
If Plan A doesn’t work, have a Plan B to turn to!
Yes, things don’t always go to plan, but do you have a backup plan?
Here’s one example…
We received an order from one of our regular clients. They needed some company branded pens, which were due to be delivered early the following week.
Then something happened.
On the Thursday, we were told there was a potential issue with their courier, and these pens were time sensitive. They were for an event, so a delay in delivery was a massive issue for us and an issue for our customer.
So, what was our option?
To tell the client we wouldn’t be able to fulfil their order on time?
No chance!
Because they chose to work with us, they trusted us to deliver on our promises.
On the Friday, we had the confirmation from the courier. The delivery was not going to happen on time.
There was no way we could let down our customer. We take great pride in delivering on our promises.
So, we made some calls. We have built great industry contacts over the years, and we now had a new plan of action.
We instructed a company up in the north east of the country to print the pens again for us and we drove up to collect them the same day.
We usually rely on our couriers, but time was not on our side. These pens were needed by 8.30am on Tuesday for the event.
So come Monday evening, we have our pens ready to go. We packed them in our very own Jigsaw Print van and made the long journey ourselves through the night.
Of course, the additional and unexpected expenses ate into our margin, but to us it is far more important that we delivered on our promise.
No blame game
This isn’t a blog post to whine about the logistics sector and couriers, we know what problems they are facing at present.
We appreciate that things can go wrong, and it’s not their fault for being unable to deliver. Because problems can arise from time to time. Things that we have no control over.
But you know what we did have control over? We had a van. We had the pens.
Because a delivery issue is our problem, not our customer’s.
So, we go the extra mile, or in this case many miles, to make sure the customer doesn’t lose out.
Yes, straight dealing is very much in our Yorkshire DNA, but if you want to keep customers happy, it must be in every business’ DNA, or before you know it, your customer will go elsewhere.
Standing out through service
In a competitive industry such as printing, it’s the attention to detail, the desire and commitment to going above and beyond that makes all the difference.
We’re proud of the fact that we’re a family business, and we extend the concept of family to include our customers as well.
If you treat your customers as part of your extended family, going above and beyond isn’t a chore or a nuisance, it’s something you do willingly because you care about the people behind the business.
As cliché as it sounds, people buy from people. And we truly believe that! We will always go the extra mile for our customers.
You don’t let your friends and family down, and if that’s how you come to view your customers, you’re never going to want to let them down either, it’s that simple.
Actions speak louder than words….
Of course, we didn’t want to miss a deadline, but even more so, we didn’t want to fail our customers expectations and fail on our promise.
It might sound like common sense to always go above and beyond if you want to be a successful business, but are your actions matching up with your words?
If you want us to demonstrate that actions speak louder than words, why not put us to the test?
Things can go wrong in business, but we can promise we will always find a solution. Even if it means driving through the night to deliver on our promise!
