Where's the customer service?

What a couple of weeks! Getting the new designs, shirts, website, partnership agreements, ect. ready to go for Feb. Along the way, I can't believe some of the business "BS" I had put up with.

Just for a little history, I worked with a screen printer on our first designs and put out 5,000 shirts. Not sure, but pretty confident I was one of their larger accounts. So, I called the son that seems to be running things...leave message...nothing. Call again, reach him and talk about business and a new run. He said he would touch base the following Mon. Nothing Mon., I call Tues., speak to the mother and she says how they're extremely busy. The father will call me after 4. Nothing, next day nothing, finally I say to hell with it. Make some calls and find another screen printer happy to do business and looks as though is more professional. The father did finally call me back a couple days later and spoke just how busy he was, but excited to see what I had coming out. I'm sorry, but in today's time, you had better be working better and harder than the next guy. It doesn't take much to make a quick call, email, text msg.!

It seems like customer service has become so diluted that we are pleased when someone does something they say they are going to do. It used to be going "above and beyond". Here is an example...maybe one I shouldn't post, but we sent out an order and it was lost. Customer emailed me after six days to let me know he hadn't received his order. The order should've been there and I asked if he could wait a couple days and again email me to let me know if he hadn't received them. I thought I may have been asking too much, so I offered another shirt for his inconvenience. To sum this up, the shirts never arrived, he let me know, I sent him out another order, and he "thanked" me.

Couldn't believe he thanked me, but the moral of the story is just "do what you say your going to do" and if you really care "go above and beyond". I'm trying to do both and I'll see where it gets me.