Taking Our Stone “The Extra Mile”

A great customer service story is captivating. Perhaps because it serves as a reminder that there are some pretty amazing companies who still care about their customers and are willing to go the extra mile. As Shep Hyken put it: “A brand is defined by the customer’s experience. The experience is delivered by the employees.” – or in our case, by our team of #Rockstars.

Every company claims to be customer-centric. But stories show us who’s actually ready, willing, and able to create value by going the extra mile to put its customers first. So rather than talking about our awesome customer service, we’ll let stories do the talking for us…

Mindy Recruits #Rockstars for The Extra Mile

Mindy Richard knows a thing or two about customer service. As a tenured member of our #Rockstar team, it’s safe to say her standards are high.

While struggling to find and keep trucks for a particular dealer customer, Mindy was approached by a carrier that had a truck available. And to top it off, it was $100 less than the normal rate. But she was still waiting on an order of thin stone veneer.

With rates hiking and truck availability at a minimum, Mindy didn’t want to miss out on a great opportunity for her dealer customer. So she put in a request to supervisor Dick Daun and the natural thin veneer department on second shift to complete the order of thin veneer stone, then called the dealer customer rep to let him know that she was booking the truck at the risk of the lingering building stone veneer order not making it on the load.

 Customer Confidence in Full Bloom

Mindy was worried and stressed, but she had a history of excellence and the customer was trusting and confident that she was doing all she could. So even though they wouldn’t find out whether or not they’d be rewarded for her calculated gamble until the next day, when Mindy returned from lunch later that afternoon she found a bouquet of flowers on her desk. The beautiful blooms were accompanied by a note: “Thank you to our Wonder Woman that always manages to pull through for us. Hopefully these brighten your day and add some color to your workspace.”

Not only did Mindy go through the extra steps of offering inspiring customer service, but so did Dick and our #Rockstar colleagues in the thin stone veneer department. Their efforts were rewarded. The final thin stone veneer order got loaded on the truck first thing the next morning.

Anything But Vanilla

Customer service isn’t just something we do, it’s who we are. Buechel Stone without best experiences would be like an ice cream shop that only offers vanilla. And that’s just not us. Because once you’ve experienced flavors of excellence, there’s nothing special about vanilla.

Around here, going above and beyond is expected – even if it means you might not always win. Here’s another story from Mike Buechel about “walking the walk” when it comes to delivering the kind of service that’s anything but vanilla.

The Extra Mile for the Same Page

We were bidding a project that had roughly 75 architects working on it. In this project, the final decisions were run through two of the architects and two project owners. Yes, there were a lot of hoops to go through to get answers on questions relating to “the look” they wanted.

One Friday we were told to make up a new sample panel that had to be on-site by Monday. No LTL carrier would guarantee it would get there on time, so we hired someone to take a pickup truck more than 2,000 miles one way because one of the decision makers wanted something a little different than one of the other decision makers wanted.

In the end, we didn’t get the project, but sometimes these are the levels you have to go through to get everyone on the same pages. And yes, sometimes literally going the extra mile is needed. It might not mean you’ll win the project, but it does show you are willing to do what is needed.

Habits of Success

What makes Buechel Stone unique is what we do. Your goals and visions become ours. Your concerns become our worries. And providing best experiences is what gets us out of bed every morning.

Our stories reveal our truths. And we’re looking forward to bringing you more inspirational stories of great people going above and beyond. Because, as Benjamin Franklin would put it, “Well done is better than well said.”

Tracy Lisowe | Marketing Director
&
Mike Buechel | COO, Owner
Buechel Stone Corp.