Customer Service Win!

Last weekend my friend Malory had her housewarming party at the new house she just bought in Denver. Clearly, I was not able to attend, as I am oh-so-far-away in the East. So, knowing Malory's love for flowers, I figured I would send some her way. And here my first experience ordering flowers online begins.

First, what flowers to send? I certainly have my favorites, but I'm not sure if they are Malory's favorites. And anyone who has seen You've Got Mail knows the value of daisies, but in my mind those are a springtime flower. So I decided to go with sunflowers, because they seemed seasonally appropriate, but equally friendly.

Next, what website do I use? Google: order flowers online. Options: 1800flowers.com, ftd.com, or proflowers.com. 1800flowers is a phone number, so I'm not really in favor of that. FTD.com sounds interesting, but they don't have sunflowers, not to mention the fact that I still don't know what FTD stands for. Proflowers.com! OH I know someone who LOVES Proflowers!



Proflowers.com it is! Thanks for the recommendation, Ro!

So I manage to successfully order flowers, scheduled to arrive the day before the party. Perfect. That day arrives and I now have a tracking number to see the shipping status. I check it out. The flowers are in Canada! And the status is: Incorrect Routing at UPS Facility. Uh oh. This is bad. New delivery date: 3 days later than it is supposed to be! I am pretty sure that if you keep flowers out of water for 3 days they are likely to not be living, which is just no good. So I decide it would be a good idea to get in touch with customer service, which I do, via email:

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Customer Comments: Hi,

This is my first time ordering flowers online, and I had heard good things about proflowers.com, so I decided to give it a try. I ordered flowers to be delivered to a friend today, since I cannot attend her housewarming party. I went to the tracking page to make sure everything looked alright, and it says that the delivery date was rescheduled due to an incorrect routing at the UPS facility. The new delivery date is listed as 11/16. I am really disappointed that she will not be getting her flowers today, and I am also concerned that when she gets her flowers on Monday that they will be dead. Is there any way to make sure she gets her flowers today? Or do I just have to wait and see if she gets dead flowers on Monday? I feel that sending dead flowers to a friend will have the opposite effect on the friendship than I was hoping for. Please let me know if there is anything that can be done.

Thanks,
Meghan

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And I get this very nice and quick response!

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Dear Meghan, Order Number: xxxxxxxxx

Thank you for contacting ProFlowers. Please accept our most sincere apologies for the delivery delay of your gift as this is not typical of our service. We definitely don't want your first experience with us to be negative.

We realize the importance of timely deliveries and have refunded your delivery charge of $9.99 to help make this up to you. Please allow 5-7 business days for this refund to fully process.

In addition, we want to make sure your recipient receives a fresh bouquet. For this reason we have ordered a replacement with a delivery date as reflected below. If the selected date is not satisfactory, please contact us and we will be happy to modify it to a more convenient date. Please note we can schedule deliveries for Tuesday through Friday if we receive notification and process the change by noon Pacific Standard Time the business day before the desired delivery date.

Please know that you will NOT be charged for this replacement order. However, we want to keep you informed regarding your order status, so you WILL receive automatic confirmation, shipping, and delivery emails.

ORDER INFORMATION:

Order Number: xxxxxxxxxxxx

Delivery Date: Saturday, November 14, 2009 (unfortunately we cannot do same day delivery on a replacement)

If you have any further questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Once again, please accept our sincere apologies. We greatly appreciate both your trust and business and hope to serve you again in the future.




Best Regards,

HB Mike
Customer Care
ProFlowers
Send love, not like. Send ProFlowers.

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A replacement bouquet? I like the sound of this. This leaves me to wonder, does this mean Malory will be getting two sets of sunflowers? It certainly does, and apparently neither of them were dead and they both managed to arrive on Saturday morning, still before the party! So we close my first experience ordering flowers online with:

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Dear HB Mike,
Thank you for being so prompt in addressing my issue with a delay in the delivery of the flower order I placed last week. I really appreciate the effort that was made to have the flowers delivered as soon as possible, once the delivery routing error was realized. My friend has received her flowers and says they are beautiful.
Sincerely,
Meghan

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so much contra dancing

Lately it seems that my only activity during waking hours that is not work is contra dancing. I like it a lot. In October I got to go to one of the twelve hour long dances. And since it was so long, we took a break in the middle to check out the pumpkin festival. And since it was so long, I also did not attempt to dance every dance, and as a result I have a few pictures and videos. The dance was the Fall Ball in the Peterborough town hall, which has a balcony that overlooks the dance floor, which is where these shots are taken from.

Never Refrigerate

To whom it may concern,

I have just purchased 1 U.S. dry pint of Santa Sweets Grape Tomatoes. I noticed that the container specifies, "NEVER REFRIGERATE." Is this true? I am quite accustomed to refrigerating any tomatoes I purchase, so without even realizing it, this package was automatically put in the refrigerator. Should I be concerned about eating these tomatoes that have now been refrigerated? Why is it important to never refrigerate your grape tomatoes?

Thank you,
Meghan

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Meghan,

Thanks for the email! The "NEVER REFRIGERATE" is on the label because tomatoes (in general) begin to loose thier flavor profile at temperatures below 50 degrees. Also, once they get below 50 when you take the tomatoes out and return them to "room temperature" they will have a reduced shelf life.
Ironically the Santa Sweets will have an excellent shelf life when kept in the 'fridge and the change in flavor profile is very sublte over the first 10 days.
You're ok keeping them in the fridge as long as you're aware of the reduced shelf life after they come out of the fridge.

Feel free to contact us with any further questions.

Thanks,

Chris Cunnane
National Sales Director
Santa Sweets

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Good Morning Meghan,
Thank you for your email. It is safe to eat your tomatoes. The reason why our container has “never refrigerate” is when grape tomatoes are kept at temperatures below 50°F the natural sugars break down and the tomatoes will not be as sweet. We recommend the tomatoes be stored in an open container at room temperature out of direct sunlight. Although refrigeration will extend the shelf life it will never have the same flavor profile as if you were to leave them at room temperature. Please let me know if you have any other questions.


Thank you,
Heather Wladyka
Sales Associate
Santa Sweets, Inc.
Tel: 813-759-0765 ext 1166
Cell: 813-786-0381
Fax: 813-759-8372
Email: hwladyka@santasweets.com