To whom it may concern:
My name is Liliana J Stephenson, multilingual educator and youth cricket advocate. I hold a BA in Spanish, German and English teaching secondary education, plus a certificate in teaching English to non-native speakers. I have lived all over the world including Chicago, Australia, Sri Lanka, England, Scotland and Ireland. I currently work at the Wendy’s in Carroll, Ohio.
How I came to be a crew member is quite miraculous and not the focus of this email, but how the cultures of societies differ and how that affects drive through times…is.
I have been observing how this Wendy’s operates, the comments of the guests and employee interactions with coworkers and customers. There has been mention made by several of my coworkers that there is a weight being placed on them to “work more quickly” to get drive through times down. It seems that this directive is coming from higher than our general manager, who, by the way, works her tail off for this store.
I talked at length with a friend of mine who owns a different fast food restaurant in Arizona. He says that his observation in his 25+ years experience that often the guests’ own preparedness affects the pace of the selling experience.
I have been thinking a lot about that.
During my few weeks working in the back cash position I have heard the following:
“You are so friendly!”
“I love that you are here, you make my day!”
“You are a ray of sunshine!”
“This Wendy’s is the friendliest one around. We only come here now.”
I was trying to figure out how I make people’s day, how I’m so friendly and why would that make a difference to the public in general. Then someone said to me:
“You talk to me and you listen. Hardly anyone does that anymore.”
It is true. I greet customers, thank them for their patience if we have a line (which the response is often “oh, not a problem”), take their payment and as the card reader processes, I ask them how their day is, encourage them to keep going and find something in common to chat about it before wishing them well and send them on their way if the line is moving. If we’re waiting on the car ahead, I talk to the guests more.
Since I’ve noticed the pressure to “work faster” I’ve observed some of my guests: older men and women whose hands and fingers work hard to shakily find wallets and purses to give me exact change, frazzled moms who are trying to find their cards, because they didn’t get put back in the midst of some child mishap and those with blurry eyes trying to find wallets in dark after a long, long day of work or travel.
Then there was the woman who paid me with $17.79 in change, the young man who had twenty-six one dollar bills and the gentleman who wanted me to use his health savings card for his lunch.
“Sir,” I said, “I don’t think this card will work.”
“Try it,” he responded. “They owe me money.”
Human interaction takes time.
Is there a balance? Absolutely, but I, for one, will not shame guests into “finding their money faster” so I can get a better time. If my time with guests is penalizing the store, then please, penalize me. It’s not fair that the whole restaurant be punished for someone who cares about people.
It’s the caring that makes our store different though.
There was the woman who broke down because her son had just died.
The woman who buried her cat that she had for 14 years.
The young man who went to North Carolina on vacation for 10 days, then came back to tell me about it, because I asked him to.
Alan, who always buys a 6 piece nugget with no sauce and loves riding his 3 wheeled motorcycle.
Jerry, who is in for breakfast and dinner because his wife just isn’t well, but thanks God every day to be above ground.
The high school kid who was on the verge of quitting life because things were too hard.
“Sweet Tea” who comes in before her overnight lab shift and always orders a brewed sweet tea, because we are the only ones who offer it and loves how it tastes.
Mary comes through when she feels like she can leave the house. She comes to Wendy’s for a friendly face.
The family whose kids come through 3 times a week after school to see if “the Wendy’s lady” is there so I can ask them about their day before they get their chicken nuggets and go home.
Like using standardized tests to measure what students know, drive through numbers don’t tell the whole story. Carroll, Ohio is not as fast paced as Chicago, which means, many of our customers, regardless of age, work on a slower time frame. Many of our customers are older and are not in a rush to be anywhere. Much of our evening clientele is families coming back from practice: soccer, volleyball, football, dance. It is difficult to put together multiple kids meals + adult sandwiches each with different toppings, all the fries and the multiple chocolate junior frosties/drinks from the time they are ordered until they get to the window.
I have heavily advertised the app (which a few guests have adopted, rave about, and have thanked me for), but the moms who are so so so tired are just trying to get their kids food and into bed, the app is “just one more thing” and it may take them time to get the whole order to the order taker, because kids constantly change their minds, and they are apologizing to me at the window because it took so long.
“Look,” I said, “if this is the worst thing that happened today, it’s still a great day.”
To whom it may concern: we’re still a great store, regardless of our drive through stats. Unfortunately, society in general uses numbers as a measurement. Fast food restaurants use drive through times to show efficiency.
Once society turns people into numbers, we lose focus on the individual.
May Wendy’s come up with a system to revolutionize how fast food restaurants measure success.
Sincerely yours,
Liliana J Stephenson