It is easy as small business owners to get tunnel vision or a jaded perspective on what our guests want, what is working well, and where we need to improve.  It is also easy to get complacent in areas that are not our passions or areas of expertise and since they are working “well enough” they don’t get the attention they sometimes need.  A fresh perspective from our guests can help us to see any blind spots that need our attention.  

The best way to do this is through a survey.  Today we are going to talk about the different ways to conduct surveys and what questions we should ask.

What should the survey include?

Keep it short...

This can be a tough one to navigate.  Should you charge for the 85-year-old grandmother that is just there to watch her grandchild open presents at a birthday party?  Should you charge for parents that are there to help with the field trip?  What about someone that is physically handicapped and won’t be participating in any activities?  These are all tough scenarios to navigate while keeping your customers happy but let’s talk through some of the options you have.

Insurance
First and foremost, check with your insurance carrier to see what their requirements are around this.  I have never personally run into a provider that...

Last week we talked about how to be intentional about customer service and we focused on being relational. I was thinking about how that skill is sometimes easier for some than it is for others. Some people come by it naturally when others have to work at it. We recommend instructing your staff and maybe even role playing how to implement this quality. Let’s face it. Some of our guests make it very difficult to be relational. Confrontational maybe, but not relational! But our response to difficult situations will set us apart from the competition.

This week I want to focus on the second aspect of intentional customer service. While it is...

As Agritourism owners we find ourselves in a wide variety of stores for a wide variety of reasons. Even though price is a big determining factor for whether or not I frequent a store, there are other factors that are equally important. If you were to ask me my opinion about the 3 local hardware stores that I visit the most, I would most likely evaluate them based on price, inventory and customer service. And based on those things there is one store that stands out and one I will go out of my way to support.

There are few things more important to a customer than personal service. I believe they will even pay a little bit more if they thin...

1.  Clean & Plentiful Bathrooms

The reality is that most Agritourism venues with heavy seasonal crowds don’t have enough indoor bathroom facilities to keep up with the demand.  That means we have to resort to the dreaded Porta-Potty.  This is the worst nightmare of germaphobes’.  Your guests may be on their way to having an outstanding customer experience (see our blog post from last week) and a dirty bathroom or Porta-Potty may be the lasting memory that sticks longer that all the great experiences they had that day.  Or if their 5-year-old decides they have to go NOW and there are long lines for all the bathrooms.

With ev...