Comments on: what’s so bad about the l.a. times coffee article?

By: Lynn Moore

Lynn Moore — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 20:13:43 +0000

Enjoyed the blog. September 29 is National Coffee Day.

By: coffee girl

coffee girl — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 16:22:46 +0000

Yeah I do agree customers are always right especially in this day and age with trying to have really good customer service.

By: Ultimate Home Business

Ultimate Home Business — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 19:10:12 +0000

customer is always right!

By: Brenner

Brenner — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 18:43:59 +0000

Well said. Good to hear a bit of pro-customer stance from an artiste of the bean.

Although, hell, you don’t have to actually LIKE the people you serve … you just have to be able to like SERVING them.

Maybe: The customers that know good coffee are paying you for good coffee. The customers that don’t know good coffee are paying you for good coffee and for your graciously suffering their ignorance.

In cafe veritas,
B

By: Jack

Jack — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 20:36:44 +0000

“we risk liking coffee too much and people not enough.” Nails it on the head for me. Have to appreciate the drinker or it already sets up a bias to not like the coffee.

By: natural skin care

natural skin care — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 09:51:01 +0000

Well, i have to agree with bz that service is for the customers.

By: bz

bz — Wed, 05 May 2010 04:21:16 +0000

ah, the murky incident. which makes me want to clarify that i’m not one of those customer-is-always-right types. that slogan seems an overcrassification of a much more subtle and complex idea of what it means to really serve a person.

sometimes the higher service would seem to be insisting on firm standards. but to what end? in my view, it’s FOR the customer — not for the proprietor. cross that line, and it seems like you’ve got a license to be tone deaf, jerky and self-aggrandizing at the expense of what a consumer may be thinking.

By: nickcho

nickcho — Tue, 04 May 2010 15:34:33 +0000

People should be doing the best job that they can, working to produce the best tasting coffee they can, as often as they can.

Despite the myth of the iced-espresso story from murky coffee a couple years ago, my policy was: no espresso to go, no espresso-over-ice, no customers may change the way we make espresso (can you pull it long?), and If a customer asks for one of these, the baristas are to simply inform the customer, “i’m sorry, but we don’t serve ___, it’s against store policy.” If the customer continues to probe, “It’s just store policy.” They were not to explain the “quality reasons” for the policy.

The quality standards, including those involving what we offer and don’t offer, are about our quality principles and values. While the opportunity to “educate” is tempting, unless we know that the taste of the drink will support the standard and close to 100% of the time, it’s very, very risky. I think that the LA Times article shows what can happen when you take that risk.

So my policy at murky was that the baristas were to just blame the owner. I did not want the baristas fighting that fight with the customers, and I was happy to play the scapegoat.

By: bz

bz — Tue, 04 May 2010 13:33:42 +0000

whoa, jay. a few more cans of worms in that one. seems like another possibly avoidable situation by Spro that gave a weird, dismissive tag-team an excuse to be weird and dismissive.

By: sprobro

sprobro — Tue, 04 May 2010 07:57:04 +0000

@aboutferguson haha. keep tweeting about pollyanna and the bill of rights, and i think you’ll be cool.

By: sprobro

sprobro — Tue, 04 May 2010 07:34:37 +0000

@NickCho as a journalist, i hear it more and more: you don’t emphasize my viewpoint, therefore, you’re a bad journalist. it peeves.

By: sprobro

sprobro — Tue, 04 May 2010 06:31:13 +0000

@jimseven thanks! like most (i suspect) i’m struggling with having a life and also many of my coffee thoughts being syphoned off on twitter.

By: jimseven

jimseven — Tue, 04 May 2010 06:18:04 +0000

@sprobro you should write more blog posts, cos I like them.

By: The Onocoffee

The Onocoffee — Tue, 04 May 2010 06:03:46 +0000

If you thought that was bad journalism, have a look at this:

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/dining/reviews/blog/2010/04/the_13_cup_of_joe_reviewed.html

By: sprobro

sprobro — Tue, 04 May 2010 05:54:47 +0000

Blog post: what’s so bad about the l.a. times coffee piece? http://www.chemicallyimbalanced.org/2010...

By: aboutferguson

aboutferguson — Tue, 04 May 2010 03:48:26 +0000

@sprobro please DO NOT EVER emphasis my view point and I will happily keep reading thx (http://www.chemicallyimbalanced.org/ —on—> http://www.latimesmagazine.com/2010/05/c...)

By: NickCho

NickCho — Tue, 04 May 2010 03:25:01 +0000

@sprobro I agree with @jimseven. Awesome blog. Tough-love but true!!!