When I opened the brown cardboard box, the handwritten note attached to the tissue paper around the package stood out.
The note was written in pen and spelled my first name correctly, something I noted doesn’t always happen.
When was the last time you received a handwritten note?
Tea, Winter Cold, and Customer Service
In early January this year, I stopped at a local coffee shop to buy spicy cinnamon tea.
Years ago, I bought the tea packaged in a beautiful decorated tin. Turns out the shop changed to a different tea company.
The tea wasn’t sold in a beautiful tin, but a colorful, heavy-weight sustainable paper box.
And it was made by a local tea business, added bonus!
Staff promised me it was a good tasting tea. So I bought a 12-sachet box.
And made some tea that day.
My local coffee shop staff were correct, it was a good tea.
Especially tasty during our recent frigid (below -10 degrees Fahrenheit) temperatures in southeast Michigan.
Warming up with a cup of hot spicy cinnamon tea after spending two to three hours birding in southeast Michigan was something I looked forward to.
I shared the local tea company with my friends and told them how much I enjoyed the tea.
But the third time I made tea, the sachet broke open. Leaving tea leaves floating in hot water.
Disappointed, I heated up more water, and put another tea sachet in to steep.
Only to have it happen twice more: the sachet broke open and tea leaves dispersed throughout the hot water.
Argh!
You’d think the second time it happened, I would think to filter the leaves through cheesecloth.
But for some reason, I didn’t.
Annoyed, I looked up the company’s website, found their contact form, and quickly sent an online message how frustrated I was to have three sachets (out of 12) break open while steeping.
Quick Response
The next day, before noon, I received an email message reply from Greg at Fraser Tea, asking for more information.
Which I provided.
Less than two hours later, I received an apology from Greg about the tea sachets breaking open:
Thank you for reaching out to us, and I sincerely apologize for any inconvenience caused by the quality issue you encountered.
Your feedback matters, and we’re committed to making things right for you.
Along with options, which included having a replacement box of the spicy cinnamon tea sent to me.
A few days later I received a package in the mail.
With my replacement box of spicy cinnamon tea and a handwritten note.
A nice touch that made me smile!
What made me smile more: Greg added four sachets of their other tea varieties to the package.
What a nice gesture.
Am I a happy customer of Fraser Tea? Yes. They’re:
- Local
- Quick to respond to customers
- I’ve enjoyed their spicy cinnamon and green mint organic teas.
(I still have three of their other sample teas to try out.)
Visiting their website, I learned Fraser Tea uses compostable non-GMO (Genetically Modified Organism) pyramidal sachets made from sugar beets or sugar cane.
Their teas are organic, handcrafted blends, and all packaging is biodegradable.
Sounds like a company I want to support!
Plus I love their bicycle, flowers, leaves, berries, and herb illustration that sits above every website page footer.
The same illustration that adorns their individually-wrapped sachets.
As I wrote in 2014, when I received a handwritten note from a tech company:
It’s the small things.
We hear it frequently in our everyday life and work.
Those small acts of kindness:
- Holding a door open for someone with their hands full
- Reaching the product on the top shelf in the grocery store for a shopper who can’t reach it, or in my case
- Listening to your customer, taking action, and sending a handwritten note
are courtesies that create wonderful memories and make a big difference in our relationships.
