Look For Creative Ways Of Making People You Meet Feel Special 

Editorial by Robert Kirwan

   It is awfully difficult these days to find anything positive to say about going to the gas station to fill up on overpriced gasoline. Nevertheless, the other day a young man named Ryan McFadden served me at the local Petro Canada and he reminded me that there are people in this world who have a knack for saying just the right thing to make others feel special.

   I stopped in just before lunch to fill up my wife’s car. Ryan served me, took my $30 and returned with a receipt, offering me a polite, “Have a nice day.”

   After lunch, I returned with my truck and pulled up to the pump. Ryan once again came out and greeted me with a sincere, “Hello. You’re back again.” The fact that he recognized me out of all of the customers who he had seen that day and the fact that he remembered me being there in a different vehicle would have been enough. However, when I gave him my $50 this time along with the Petro Points card, he stopped abruptly and said, “You didn’t have this card this morning. I will put the points from the last purchase on the card for you.” He even remembered the amount of gas I had purchased.
  
   Obviously Ryan is just pumping gas as a job while he decides what to do with his life. He will continue his education and likely end up in a very nice career. However, what he did that day demonstrated that Ryan has a gift for making people feel special. The fact that he not only remembered and acknowledged that he had served me earlier in the day, but that he also remembered that I had not received the Petro Points I had earned, and then took it upon himself to make sure I was given those points made the pain of getting “gassed at the pumps” a whole lot easier to take.

   The experience with Ryan reminded me of a story I had read about a grocery store bagger named Johnny. Johnny had Down’s Syndrome and decided to do something to make a difference for the customers he met during the day. Since Johnny liked quotations, each day he would pick out one that he liked and he and his father would use the computer to print off a number of copies. Johnny cut the sayings in little strips and then signed his name to the back of the little strips of paper. When he packed the groceries for a customer he would drop the little strip into the bag and say, “I hope you enjoy my quote of the day.”

   Within a few weeks, the lineups at Johnny’s checkout were three times as long as the others. Customers would wait in line just so they could get one of Johnny’s quotes of the day. In fact, some customers were coming to the grocery store 2 or 3 times a week just to see the smile on Johnny’s face as he dropped in his favourite quote.
  
   Eventually the practice caught on and the lady in the floral department began cutting off broken flowers and pinning them on elderly women; the guy in the meat department was putting his favourite Snoopy stickers on the packages and talking to his customers; everyone was finding creative ways to put their mark on service.

   The lesson here is pretty obvious. When it comes to service, we all have our unique gifts to offer. However we'll never make the emotional connection with the customer unless it begins in our heart. What Ryan did that day may have seemed insignificant, but it certainly left a mark on me. What Johnny did in the grocery story certainly left a mark on his customers. It has made me even more committed to doing my part to making people with whom I come in contact realize that they too are important to me and that I do care about them a lot.

   This week see what you can do to leave your mark on the people with whom you come into contact.

   Have a good week!