Laughable Customer Service

I know I’ve been telling you a lot lately about underperforming customer service. Today, I had an experience that was so over the top (in the other direction) that I thought I should mention it here. It’s laughable actually.

Last weekend, I went to dinner at a fancy restaurant in LA called Yamashiro. You can check out their web site at www.yamashirorestaurant.com for more details, but I’ll sum it up for you briefly here.

The Yamashiro building was built in 1911 by two brothers and is a replica of a palace in Japan. In the 1920’s, it became the headquarters of the “400 Club” – an exclusive Hollywood hangout. During the Great Depression and until WWII was over, the place was boarded up. In 1948, it was bought and turned into the restaurant it is now.

Yamashiro has a private drive for their guests and only allow valet parking. They serve high end sushi and drinks overlooking their beautiful outdoor Japanese garden. The service and food are great, as you can imagine.

Anyway, the laughable part came today when I received a thank you note from our waiter. First of all, since when do waiters write thank you notes? Secondly, the hand writing was all bubbly and curvy. The thing is, our waiter was a man… and this is clearly not his hand writing!

Anyway, the restaurant is great! Go there, try it, and let me know if you get a random thank you note. J