Coffee arrived open, would you expect a replacement?

Ernie1 Situations like this are not common. I can recollect 3 instances in the last 20 months, where the roasters were excellent.

1: Two KGs went MIA. They were untracked RM. The seller refunded. I purchased 3 KGs after that. I paid a bit extra to get them delivered by DPD instead.

2: One roaster sent 2 × 1 KG pack with no roast date. They just had a serial number. I called them. They apologised, told me they were roasted a month before sending out. Offered a replacement or a refund. I accepted neither, as the coffee was ok. I never purchased anything from them.

3: Recently, I had issues on a few 250g packs from one of the popular roasters. Every one of them under weighed by about 15g - 18gs. I emailed them with the evidence. They apologised, offered a full refund as a gesture of good will and thank you for bringing the problem to their attention. I always liked their coffee. I did not take a full refund. I turned it down. Instead, they sent me a token refund of 20%. They never explained what went wrong, but advised me they will fix their machinery.

While it is entirely fair if one were to take the offered refund, some times drawing a line does put a smile on the roaster’s face, especially under very difficult circumstances. 🙂

Ernie1 That’s a shame.

Did you call them? Please do, if you haven’t. It is the busiest time of the year.

Ernie1 I just called them and they were full of apologies and are sending out a replacement.

I guess the moral of that is that direct contact is worth the effort.

I’ve long believed, and acted on, the notion that customer service is a very good indicator of the quality of a company, and that I can read FAR more into how they handle a problem than often is implied by the problem itself. More than a few times over the years I’ve blacklisted a company over customer service, even if the product itself is usually fine. Or conversely, stuck with a company that have provided good customer service, even if I paid a price premium for doing so.

Which leads to the lesson for businesses - it’s fairly hard to gain a good reputation, and it takes time and effort. It’s pretty easy, especially in these web-connected days to lose a good reputation, and very difficult indeed to lose a bad reputation once you’ve ‘earned’ it. In fact, it can be impossible to shift a bad reputation, not least because many customers will simply move on, and never give you another thought. Or chance. I operate on the “fool me once, shame on you, but fool me twice, shame on me” principle.

As a side note, I do have some sympathy for those operating small or medium businesses. However much the owners care (and some don’t), and however much they sweated blood and tears building a business, some employees just won’t give a …. fig. It’s probably the biggest single challenge facing a business that’s grown beyond “work from a spare bedroom” scale - employing people. Not only are the administration and legal aspects a collossal pain in the butt, and they truly are, but they can do oh so much damage, very fast indeed, if they don’t care.

Kudos to CrownandCanvas for the “stale beans” offer. That is the kind f thing that leads me to feel like trying them, next time I order coffee.