What were you thinking Gordon? How an innocuous action can undermine your brand

Gordon Ramsay Hospital Road is one of only four 3* Michelin Restaurants in the UK. Its reputation is excellent, built up over 12 years of enjoying the highest culinary accolade in the world.

So it’s not surprising that the dining experience is amazing there.

Of course it’s not just the food that delivers: the service is wonderful too. From the welcome on arrival to the sommelier’s understanding of my budget and the clumsy description of what I wanted;  the discipline and military precision by which each course was served by the waiters under the authoritative, watchful command of the Maitre D; and the rich, detailed descriptions of each plate of food as it arrived.

The Maitre D  was particularly brilliant acting the host, attentive without interfering, charming without becoming too familiar. He even offered to introduce us to the brilliant head chef Clare Smyth, the only female head chef of a Michelin 3* restaurant and deservedly conferred with an MBE in the June 2013 honours list.

Great brands establish reputations on meeting expectations. A Michelin 3*star rating + Reputation + Price means you expect the best experience possible. But you also expect a certain style and panache in the way they behave, not just in the restaurant but generally, in the way they conduct themselves.

So what on earth were they thinking sending me this email a few days after my last visit?

Dear Restaurant Gordon Ramsay Guest,

Many thanks for your recent reservation at Restaurant Gordon Ramsay.  If you would kindly spare a few minutes, we would be delighted if you would click on the following link and complete a short ten question survey on your experience with us.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/6K3GVK5

Your time and comments would be greatly appreciated and if I can be of any assistance in the meantime, please do not hesitate to contact me.

With kind regards,

Phillip Rowlands
Guest Relations Manager

What were they thinking?

1. An impersonal greeting: I just spent a few hundred pounds there and they can’t be bothered to address me in person?
2. It uses ‘survey monkey’, a free online research tool used by small businesses. Smells cheap to me. What about a call or a letter, wouldn’t that be more in keeping?
3. Who the hell is Phillip Rowlands? We developed a brief relationship there with the Maitre D who was called Jean-Claude Breton. Why send an email from someone else?

But why did they feel the need to do this at all? The staff on the day know how well we got on and are best placed to manage customer satisfaction and best placed to sort them out.

I suspect that there is a marketing department somewhere which has been asked to run Customer Satisfaction surveys by some idiotic business manager (Phillip perhaps?). And being hard-pressed and budget restricted, they have opted for the lazy, cheapest way to execute their wishes. But in the act of so doing, they undermine their own brand – lazy and cheap are not characteristics they’d like to be associated with. But in a single thoughtless email, they undermine not just the hard work of people like Clare and Jean-Claude but 12 years of reputation building.

Follow