Why Does Everything Have to Be So Hard?

The new TVs were nice, but there’s no free lunch. We didn’t have access to the rink offices, so I can just report what I was told. The new DirecTV boxes were in a locked room behind the front desk and only 2 people had keys to that room – Todd and Mad Max. There was a phone app to change the channels, but Todd refused to give me access. He did give Kyle the Bartender access to the app. Even if Todd didn’t like me and wanted to make my life miserable, not giving me access was stupid. I was in the rink more than anybody, more than Todd, more than Kyle, more than Max, and I couldn’t change the channels on the TVs.

I guess when you have a monopoly, customer service is not necessary. The local hockey team owned just about all the rinks in the metroplex and I understand they had noncompete agreements with all the coaches so the coaches couldn’t meet their students at a cheaper rink to help them save money on practice ice. So eventually most of the outside rinks closed or were bought out by the local hockey team. I’m telling you this because a good manager with customer service in mind would have trained their people on the new process of changing channels on the new TVs. Even if it’s not their job to change the channels, they need to know what the process is. Customers go to the front desk and the bar to get their favorite game or program all the time and Todd knew that. Yet he didn’t train his people.

Now that I couldn’t change the channels, I had to send all the customers to the front desk for channel changes. Many customers expressed disdain, as they hated to have to deal with the young smart-ass men working there. I felt their pain but couldn’t help them. (As a side note, in the 2.5 years I was there, I was shocked at how many customers came to me with questions about the rink, stating those people at the front desk didn’t know sh*t.) Since the front desk people had not been trained on the new process, they would send the customers back to me telling them the boxes were behind the bar and we had to change the channel. That was the old process, so I had to send the customer back to the front desk. People got so angry, and I don’t blame them. It’s ridiculous to be sent back and forth. So when I finished with my customers I would go to the front desk with them and try to tell the workers to get Max or Todd to change the channels. They didn’t believe me and wouldn’t do it. This went on for weeks because Todd wouldn’t own up to the process to his own people. Finally, the coach who was head of the figure skating program came to me, pissed as hell. Why was I sending these customers to the front desk for channel changes? I got her to sit down at one of the tables in the lobby and I explained the new process to her. I took her behind the bar and showed her that the old DirecTV boxes were gone. Finally, someone saw the light. All Todd had to have done was tell his people that channel changes were now to go to Todd or Max. How hard is that? Why wasn’t it handled after the first misunderstanding instead of weeks later? And all this poor customer service and anger never would have happened.

If I didn’t have a customer, I would go to the front desk with people to ask for a channel change, just to save time and anxiety. If Todd and Max weren’t there, nothing would happen. Todd’s employees refused to contact him if he wasn’t in the building, which was quite often. So I started emailing Todd when people wanted channel changes. He had email on his phone and could change the channels where ever he was. Especially when people wanted to watch the local hockey team’s game and it wasn’t on any of the TVs in the local hockey team’s rink. How stupid is that??? Todd wasn’t happy that he had to get out his phone and change the channels (sometimes late at night), but this was his process. He could have given me the app on my phone but he chose not to. Kyle could change the channel when he was working, but he was an hourly employee and I was not going to ask him on his days off. Kyle’s time off is his time.

I don’t even know what to say about this. It’s so ridiculous I still can’t believe it really happened. I don’t know if the local hockey team hires the most incompetent people they can find or they just don’t care.

Not a Friendship Membership

When we opened the cafe, Pierre went to Sam’s to buy a membership but they made him mad so he got a membership at Costco. It was handy and cheaper than Sysco for items like candy and water bottles. We got a business account that was enabled for tax exempt purchases since we were buying most things for resale. Pierre was good about making Costco runs for us when we were getting low on water, but he always bought sanitary wipes while he was there. I told him we didn’t need them because we already had sanitizer in squirt bottles for cleaning counters and equipment. He continued to waste our money buying the wipes, which tells me he didn’t watch the Food Handler videos or just didn’t care. Like I told you earlier, it wasn’t his money so I guess it was easy to waste.

I went to Costco and got my membership card. For the account we got, 2 people get membership cards and you have to pay extra if you want to add more people. Pierre wanted to add Nick to our account. I didn’t like the idea, because Nick wasn’t part of the cafe. Nick was a former student of Pierre and now a skating coach. I love Nick, but he’s not part of the business and really didn’t even support us much. He hardly ever bought anything from the cafe. Mainly though, Nick wasn’t qualified for tax exempt purchases and I didn’t want to be involved in any kind of sales tax fraud.

So one day, I went to Costco and when I got to the checkout they told me my membership was no good. Turns out, Pierre had put Nick on our membership even though I wasn’t in favor and when Nick was added Costco took me off. What the Heck! This is a business, not a friendship membership. I don’t know if Pierre and Nick are more than friends, but I sure don’t see any reason to have Nick on our account. It’s cheaper for him to have his own account anyway since personal accounts are cheaper. I had Nick taken off the account and got everything straightened out. I did find out later that Pierre paid the extra money for Nick to be put back on the account as a third member. I told Pierre he better make sure Nick was paying sales tax on his purchases.

This is the kind of crap you shouldn’t have to deal with when trying to build a business. I don’t know where Pierre’s brain was, but it wasn’t on building a restaurant. It’s a bad sign when your partner goes behind your back on business actions. I should have run away as fast as possible.

Hockey Camps

You’d think hockey camps would bring good money to the cafe, but even the camps had limited participation. When the local hockey team held camps in our facility, we had good business from the kids once the parents found we had a good lunch deal – 1/4 pizza, chips or fruit, cookie, and squirt top water bottle for $5.25. However, the coaches from corporate didn’t eat with us at all. These are our landlords in the building for a week and didn’t buy lunch from us even one time – in fact, Tuesday they brought in pizza from an outside restaurant. So Friday afternoon, I went over and had words with them about patronizing their tenants and setting an example for the students to patronize us as well. There was one independent hockey coach, Ryan, who approached us as soon as we opened to let us know he would recommend us in all his hockey camp emails. It was so refreshing to have at least one person who believed in supporting us and appreciated that we were there.

Every summer there was some sort of hockey ministry camp. The first time we met them, they brought us their coolers to be filled with ice. Once filled, we took the coolers out to where the camp counselors were standing. I asked the woman if there was anything we could do to get their business sometime that week. She explained they had already set up all the lunches to be brought in and they told the kids not to bring money so there would be no business for us. Then she asked if we would add water to some of the coolers. We didn’t have a faucet tall enough to get the coolers under to fill, so I suggested they talk to the front desk to see if the building had a faucet or hose to fill the coolers. When the ministry’s lunch came in the next day, she wanted to borrow a large knife. We only had one in our sanitized kitchen so we couldn’t lend it – often people forget to return items and who knows what they did with it when they had it. Having a safe kitchen was our first priority. The third day, she asked for large buffet spoons for their lunch. We didn’t have any of these because we sell pizza; we have no need for buffet serving utensils. That’s when she totally chewed me out for not helping them when they needed it. These people are supposed to be mentoring children with Christianly advise. Some of the counselors would take naps on our couch in the bar. Other times, they would set up their Bible study in front of the cafe. A huge lobby with plenty of space to set up chairs without blocking someone’s business and they set up in front of the cafe, blocking the entire counter. I don’t think these people are qualified to call themselves Christian counselors – I certainly wouldn’t want them influencing my children. I did make some money off the kids, which I think made her even more angry with me. I baked fresh cookies at lunch time each day and fresh popcorn in the afternoon. Those kids who were told not to bring money, suddenly had enough to buy cookies and popcorn. I guess I’m just evil.

Once again this boils down to ‘no outside food or drink’. It’s a must-have rule in an environment like this. Just like retail stores make deals that their competitor can’t be in the same strip center, you have to make deals in favor of your restaurant. You can always compromise outside food on a case by case basis, because no one can eat pizza for lunch 5 days in a row, but at least you have the power to deal. And where was Pierre in all of this? Why didn’t he talk to the ministry people and make a deal for the next year? He’s marketing, he should be taking care of this. And why isn’t he talking to corporate? He used to work with these guys and probably has all their emails. It is unacceptable for corporate to decide not to patronize their tenants.