Loyalty, from Ritz-Carlton
Tags: Arlington Cemetery, customer experience, loyalty, Ritz-Carlton, Washington Times
The colleagues with whom I share this blog space are geniuses at breaking down customer reward trends. How skillfully they separate customer service activities that encourage loyalty from those that discourage it is truly impressive.
As for me, I generally offer a crumb of insight into the often-inscrutable workings of the media. But I’ll devote this entry to saluting an example of loyalty-generating customer service that came to my attention via the writings of Colleen Getz, a federal worker in Washington DC who is a contributor to the Washington Times newspaper.
The background here is that Getz became acquainted with the families of Marine Lance Cpl. Justin Wilson, a young soldier killed in Afghanistan, after she witnessed an ordeal they endured in March of this year at Washington’s National Airport. Getz was at a gate where an airline employee, Getz said, begged for volunteers to give up their seats so the family could get on a flight to Dover where they were going to meet Wilson’s casket.
Following that encounter, Getz became something of an intermediary, in Washington, for Wilson’s family and the family of his 20-year-old widow. In an ensuing Washington Times column about Wilson’s burial at Arlington National Cemetery, Getz included information about the extraordinary hospitality extended by the Ritz-Carlton Pentagon City (near the cemetery) to the families.
In her account, Getz reported that the Ritz-Carlton made the hotel stay affordable for the widow, her extended family and her in-laws. Three Ritz employees most involved in the group’s stay attended the ceremony at Arlington.
Getz said the hotel made a generous offer for a luncheon after the burial, without which there would have been no gathering. Despite the fact that the number of luncheon guests started small but rose substantially, the hotel never changed its terms, Getz said. That gesture allowed 80 people, including members of Wilson’s unit just back from Afghanistan, to celebrate the slain soldier’s life together at an elegant banquet, she said.
Loyalty experts constantly talk about the importance of the customer experience. Getz wrote in reference to the Wilson families’ time in Washington for the Arlington interment, “I knew it could not be a happy occasion, but I hoped it could be a good one.”