Disservice with a smile

If one specializes in something you expect them to do a pretty bang-up job of it. The burger place must have a superb array of quality hamburgers, and the pizza joint... well, they know pizza. It's the whole reason they're still in business, and this is especially true for franchises where a good majority of people appreciate their specialty product so much they've built an empire around it.

And though it makes the most sense when the specialty product is in the title such as Kentucky Fried Chicken - or as their marketers would rather you call it, KFC - numerous popular chains are just known for something good.

In Swiss Chalet's case it's their rotisserie chicken. And when combined with french fries and their unique love-it-or-hate-it barbecue sauce (or "used dish water" as my Dad calls it) it makes you smile with contentment. Their latest campaign is chicken marinated in a spicy sauce, served with spicy, battered fries and a house salad. You would think the staff would be trained to up-sell and perfect this thing like crazy and see whether the customer demand leaps or plunges.

During my most recent visit a few days ago, many of us ordered that special with some adjustments to the sides and some opting to pay an extra 99 cents to have the white meat breast as opposed to the standard leg. Well, as dishes began to arrive at our table it seemed we had all made the right choice. Wow that chicken looked good; juicy, tender, fall-off-the-bone good. Then I got my plate.

My first thought was that, perhaps due to some kind of error in The System I ended up with a kids meal.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with The System - whether in hospitality or retail industries - all problems related to the original order are caused by something of a technological nature: computer upgrades, bar-code scanners, etc. otherwise known as The System. An alternate scapegoat is other staff members.

Well, maybe not quite a kids meal, but a portion of chicken the size of an infant's hand slapped on a huge plate beside 30 pounds of french fries somehow just doesn't look right.

I then began to analyze the situation: what would make someone not take a second glance at this and say - "Hey, wait a minute. Something here doesn't look right here because A) this will be served to an adult; and B) this is our feature dish that we are encouraged to promote. Let's put this little chicken back and grab this gentleman a piece more suitable for his age group."

But no that didn't happen, nor was any action taken by the person who brought it to our table because, well... that's likely not in her job description. All she has to do is go to kitchen, pick up food, deliver to customer. Rinse and repeat.

Thankfully our primary server was good enough and took the baby chick away, and replaced it with a man-size portion, no questions asked. What a great guy.

So you folks in the hospitality industry, or really anywhere a little common sense and input from you might benefit the customer and your company as a whole, just... give a shit. Just a little bit. Especially when your primary income depends on tips.