Recently I wrote an Odyssey article about my negative experience I had at Guitar Center. I tweeted the article at the Guitar Center handle, and I got a tweet back from a woman that is an employee of Guitar Center that told me to email a certain account. Through a couple of email exchanges, I recently got a response from the customer service manager of the store I went to. Here is the message, and below that, is my response to him. I am posting this, because it is important to realize that customer service is very real and important, and sometimes writing your experience on a public platform can make a small difference. So I of course encourage people to not be afraid to share your experiences, because maybe you can make a small or large difference too.
His E-mail:
Hello Roslyn,
Let me begin this email by apologizing both personally and on behalf of Guitar Center Danbury. Since opening this store in 2012, we have made the customer experience our number one priority. Being the Customer Service Manager here, your negative experience directly falls on my shoulders. My associates are trained rigorously on making sure that every single customer that walks through the door is greeted and taken care of for their entire visit; obviously, this was not the case in this situation.
I can assure you that I have already spoken to my entire staff about your experience in order to create a positive change in our store. What happened during your visit is completely unfair and unprofessional and we are going to make sure every customer or person that comes through our store is treated with the utmost respect, equality, and focus.
I understand that you do not intend to shop with us again and I completely understand this. However, I would like to personally extend my service to you in the event that you have any questions or need any information on products or services.
I would also like to thank you for bringing this to our attention, as a company and as a store. Mistreatment of customers from our employees will not be tolerated. If our customers are mistreated, we always want to hear about to correct it and prevent it from re-occurring.
Again, I apologize as an employee of Guitar Center and as a person; no one should ever be treated the way you were during that visit. Please feel free to reach out to me at the highlighted number below or at this email address if you would like to talk more about this situation or for anything else.
Thank you kindly for your time and have a good weekend.
My response:
Hello,
Yes, I did not have the best experience at your store, but as someone that is also in the field of marketing/customer service, please let me give credit to both you, and the team that contacted me from Salt Lake City for your utmost professionalism, being understanding during this time, and how fast this has all happened. I posted that article on Tuesday, and now Friday has come along, and I've gotten this type of response. So first off, a big thank you to the Guitar Center team for that.
As you know, what I wanted to happen was that the staff would hear about this situation, learn from it, and move on. So that the next time a young woman walks into the store by herself, and moves toward the guitars, she is seen as a serious customer, just as much as the young man that might be the next customer a couple of minutes later.
To know that this has been done, and the staff has been discussed with, truly means something to me. It is important for everyone to be treated with respect, but in the music store world, this is of extreme value because you are the ones supplying the instruments so that more music is flooded into the ears of those who listen. And let's be honest, music always ends up being a great healing device and distractor in the constant storm of bad news and violence that is ever so prominent in our NewsFeeds and TV/computer screens.
Again, I appreciate the professionalism and timeliness that has occurred during this week. I will keep your number on hand as you suggested.
Have a good weekend!
