Why the old bait & switch doesn’t work anymore

Do you remember the first time you were disappointed by a large organisation?

My earliest memory of corporate greed (we all have those, right?) was what I recall being a few months after Smarties Mini Eggs were launched in South Africa. As a lifelong fan of the traditional Smarties, when the Eggs were announced I have to admit, I got quite excited. I rushed out to the shops and bought myself a bag (or two, don’t judge) and they were delicious. The candy-coated outside was of standard Smarties quality, and the chocolate inside was a deliciously creamy chocolate delight. However, what in my mind was only a few months later (it could have been longer, but the scars are still there) I bought a bag (or two) of Smarties Mini Eggs and they just weren’t the same, specifically the chocolate inside. The original creamy milk chocolate treat I was expecting turned out to be dry, flaky, less sweet, it was a disaster. I chalked it up to a bad batch, and soon afterwards bought another bag from a different store to make sure the trusted Nestle brand didn’t let me – a Smarties flag-bearer – down. But they did. This bag was the same, and subsequent purchases over the past few years were continual repeats of excitement and pure disappointment.

The most frustrating part of it all was that I could never quite understand why they did it. As a kid growing up in a small town, trusting relationships were key. My folks trusted us at home alone from an early age, neighbours were trusted, we roamed the streets as children with no fuss, trust was a foundation for us. So when an initial agreement between two parties (the makers of the delicious bag of candy-coated treats, and me) starts out one way and then changes, I have to admit it was pretty foreign.

These days, between clickbait being a standard operating procedure for news sites, and colddrink manufacturers slowly moving from 340ml tins to 300ml tins and keeping the same relative price (don’t think we’re not watching you guys too!) the world has become accustomed to being built up only to just be let down, Buttercup. It’s a sad state, and has, in my opinion, caused far more skeptism in our society than what I believe should be the norm. Trust in your word and agreements are not what they used to be.

So why am I telling you about eggs, colddrinks and clickbait?

Whether you’re a B2B or B2C business, working with a client means you have an agreement, a relationship, and trust that both parties will do what they are expected to do. Oftentimes though – with time – SLAs slip, SOPs lean to guidelines as opposed to the rules, and representatives slack on obligations because they get too comfortable. So don’t be a Smarties Mini Egg and disappoint over time. Trust is broken extremely quickly. Keep your creamy goodness, hold that trust, and continue to deliver great service.

Acknowledging the First Pancake (and being excited about the rest)

I love pancakes. I’ve been making pancakes since I was a kid, and the recipe has been tattoo’d onto my brain since I was about 11 years old. In all honesty, I’ve made and eaten thousands of pancakes in my lifetime. I even joke with my nieces about how I have a separate pancake stomach where I fit them all in, and every market visit becomes a competition to see who can eat more of them. I always win. I don’t know how it works, but it’s wonderful.

So as a self-proclaimed GrandMaster PancakeMaker, I early on in my pancake-making journey understood the standard element of the “First Pancake”. Either too greasy or too dry – depending on your first lubricating layer – the First Pancake never makes it to the table. It’s tasty-enough (of course you have to eat it while you’re making the Second Pancake) but it’s not winning any awards for design or structure. However, the First Pancake – while not being the pancake that shines – is crucially important.

Why?

It’s the pioneer! It’s the pancake who goes out and sets the scene. It gets the pan (and you) ready for the next few. It gives you insight into the temperature of the pan, lubrication in the pan, consistency of your batter, and total volume of batter placed into the pan for each pancake. It’s the one that paves the way for the rest of them to be as majestic and delicious as they should be.

So why am I telling you about the First Pancake?

I’m hoping that you see your first day, or days, or weeks starting out the New Year as not the days you’re going to come out guns blazing and changing the world. We all need that First Pancake day or week to ready ourselves for the year ahead. The day or week to set ourselves up, to get ready, so that when the second ladel of batter hits the pan, we’re ready to rock.

So if you’re in you First Pancake week right now, don’t be too hard on yourself. You need this time to get ready. And if you, like me, are onto the Second Pancake, let’s keep flipping, rolling, and smash this year!

Language… it matters

A few years ago during another one of those Jozi heatwaves, my wife and I bought a Russell Hobbs floor fan. Nothing fancy, just the run-of-the-mill mobile fan to cool certain parts of the house while we were home.

Choosing a fan was pretty simple: We needed something simple-to-use, speedy, and of course as unobtrusive as possible. The last part meant it needed to be able to stay in a corner without really being seen, AND it needed to be quiet.

The box had a few key features displayed, like high speed; 3 speeds; vertically adjustable; and quite function. Yup, you read that right, ‘quite’ function.

Me being the optimist and uncharacteristically willing to let poor grammar slide, I placed this incorrect spelling to a lapse of design judgement and approvals, assumed it was supposed to be ‘quiet’ function, so we grabbed it, paid for it, and merrily made our way home.

At home, we gave it pride of place in the corner of our TV room, pointed directly at the couch we’d strategically placed for the best TV viewing pleasure, plugged it in, hit the level 3 of 3 speed, and were immediately transported into memories of flying in a two-seater twin-prop plane, because firstly, the wind it generated was terrific, but also, sadly, it sounded like you were sitting right in the cockpit.

Being a heatwave and all, we needed it immediately and bought it at a retail store instead of the usual online order and delivery. Had we been a bit more patient, though, and checked it out beforehand, we would have seen that even the first review of the device on Takealot says it’s noisy. Also, very clearly, there’s not ‘quite’ or ‘quiet’ function in the features list.

I’m still not sure what “quite function” means, to be honest, but it certainly doesn’t mean ‘quiet’. Language, my friends, matters.

Why you should ask someone else to buy your groceries this month

I saw this post on LinkedIn this week. My first response was “Who has ‘matches’ on their general shopping list!?” but then it reminded me of a story that happened to Lauren and me a few months ago…

In June, we were traveling from Mpumalanga to the Garden Route to move into a new nomad-ready spot in Hoekwil, near Wilderness and George. We were scheduled to arrive quite late in the evening, so before we arrived, Lauren’s mom (who lives in George) arranged with the owners of the place to allow her access so that she could stock our fridge and shelves with a few ‘bare essentials’ we’d need, as a surprise. Wonderful!

On arrival, we were indeed surprised and spoilt with some basic items like milk and bread, but there were also a few items that we would never have considered as, for us, ‘bare essentials’. The list of items – in this story – is irrelevant, but the more interesting part of what we’d experienced is how the assumption of “Everyone’s bare essentials in the home are equal” was quickly shattered. It also opened our eyes to adding or changing a few of our everyday lifestyle and food-based choices, so that we keep it interesting, and don’t get too bored with the ‘same old, same old’.

So why am I telling you this?

Living a vagabond lifestyle results in a lot of people telling us how they’re bored, they feel trapped, they want to change up their lifestyle but just can’t, etc etc etc. And while I won’t go into the flipside of a travel-forward lifestyle, there’s a few quick-fixes that people can do in their own live, right now, if they feel stuff or bored with their current way of life.

Get someone else to buy your groceries this month.

Give them a budget, a timeframe (in terms of how much food you actually need) and of course any crazy dietary requirements, and let them go wild. They’ll probably go to a different store that you go to, they may buy a different granola flavour that you automatically magnetise towards, and your eyes will be opened to a few new things you wouldn’t have tried yourself.

In the past 30 days, 53k people spoke of being bored when it comes to food. If that’s you, try something new. Or better, get someone else to try something new for you.