Last night, after dropping my our son off to his umpteenth soccer practice, the wife and went out for dinner at a Mexican restaurant. (Long time readers know how I feel about Mexican cuisine. In one word, “blah.”)

Anyhoo, at the end of the meal, Karen wanted churros. So we ordered them and waited…and waited…and waited. Finally they arrived: Four sad churros  naked and lonely on a plate.

“Um, waitress, aren’t these supposed to come with whipped cream and chocolate sauce drizzled over the top?” I ask.

“Gee you’re right. Let me take care of that for you,” she says.

And we wait…and wait…and wait.

Finally, at the 25-minute mark since we first ordered the churros, I told the waitress that we were  now in a time crunch because we had a soccer pick-up to make.

“Oh, gee. I don’t know what’s going in the kitchen. I will make sure they are brought out to you right now,” she replies.

And sure enough,  a couple minutes later four sad churros arrived naked and lonely on a plate. Yep, the same exact way the were brought to us half an hour earlier!

All we could do was laugh and ask that they be taken off our bill.

You would think that apologies would abound and that the manager would say we’ll take them off your bill but please keep the naked churros on us.”

But nooooo. They deducted them from our bill and we left…probably for good.

I talk a lot about selling stuff  because that’s what my business is about, but the second half the the equation is delivering the stuff with excellent customer service.

The fact is, you’re going to screw-up. Things are going to go wrong. Notice I said you because naturally I never mess up. (Tongue firmly planted in cheek.)

It’s how you handle your screw-ups that make the difference to whether you have repeat customers and referrals or complaints and lost business.

Sure, we want to sell a lot of our products and services but let’s not forget about the other important aspects of our businesses as well.

Kick butt, make mucho DEEnero!

Dave “Churroless In Atlanta” Dee

P.S. Speaking of selling stuff, next Wednesday I’m doing a very cool training where I’m going to teach you how to ethically read and control the minds of your prospects to dramatically increase your sales in one-on-one selling situations.

If you haven’t reserved your spot, then giddy-up over here and “get ‘er done.”