The customer is always right? Not anymore
SFGate — “Some retailers are deciding that the customer can be very, very wrong — as in unprofitable. And some, including Best Buy Co. Inc., are discriminating between profitable customers and shoppers they lose money on.”
This makes complete sense. Dropping support for unprofitable customers is a good business decision.
July 6th, 2004 at 11:49 am
Banks have been doing this for years but the difference is they have a captive audience. You put your money in a bank and the chances you will change are pretty slim.
Retail is a completely different story. I can walk in and out with no financial or emotional attachment. Being able to pre-empt a good or bad customer is not easy. Also in a retail setting I would think you are more price sensitive and thus there is little loyalty to a particular chain.
I wouldn’t shop at Good Guys because of their name alone.
July 6th, 2004 at 12:38 pm
Hmmmm. Turns out that the consultant mentioned in the article, Larry Selden, has a new book that will be published shortly, Killer Customers: Tell the Good from the Bad and Crush Your Competition. Hmmmm. Almost seems like the Associated Press article is a promotional piece for Selden. Naah ;)
Note that only the author and Selden are interested in focusing on the negative side of treating customers unequally. It makes for a more interesting story, at the cost of a bit of bias…