My New Calling

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Twice in the last week I've had to demand better service at a restaurant. Both times I have been given the food - all of it - for free. I don't yell, or even raise my voice, and yet it seems I am not to be denied. One of these experiences was quite costly for the restaurant in question; there were nine of us, eating full Italian dinners with drinks! I never saw the bill, but it was probably well over $200.

We hear all the time how we are moving toward a service economy. If this is true, then I hope we get better at it. Yesterday's encounter with terrible service involved an order-taker who had to hear the order several times, and then he walked away without a word while I was in mid-sentence, trying to answer his questions about our order! I wanted to reach over the counter and excommunicate him in a most personal and unpleasant manner.

Since this seems to happen more and more these days, it makes me wonder about a few things...

1) Am I that scary? Managers just sort of crumple up and give me free stuff to shut me up - is it me, or are they just trained to cave in? Which poses the question...

2) Are businesses planning a certain amount of free food into the budget? If so, how much is planning for staff incompetence hiking the cost of a meal? Which leads logically to the most important question...

3) How do I profit from this? Could I become a consultant, teaching staff how to avoid the unhappy customer, and managers how to deal with said customer in a less costly way? Is this the career path I've been looking for all these years?