You Will Be Satisfied

Citation

Russell, R.S. (1998), "You Will Be Satisfied", Journal of Consumer Marketing, Vol. 15 No. 1, pp. 81-82. https://doi.org/10.1108/jcm.1998.15.1.81.3

Bob Tasca is without a doubt one of the most successful Ford Motor Car dealers in history. In 209 pages he tells you how he prospered in this business. On the positive side it is an easy, anecdotal read; on the negative side it is extremely repetitious.

His thesis is simple: give your customer, and your potential customer, excellent service at all stages of your relationship and you will prosper. Fail to do so, and sooner or later you will be out of business, regardless of what that business is.

Early in his automobile selling career, Bob Tasca had the good fortune, (never does he downplay the role of luck), to give, unbeknownst to him, vital service to the then chairman of the board of the Ford Motor Company, Ernest Breech. On a warm September Saturday in 1957 a pre‐production, overheated Edsel rolled into Bob’s dealership in East Providence, Rhode Island. Very early in Bob’s dealership days, he had established an evening and Sunday open‐for‐service policy so that on this particular day he was servicing a car wearing his mechanic’s clothing. Mr Breech needed to get to a wedding on Cape Cod and was obviously in a hurry. Bob, who did not identify himself as the owner, said that the repair would take time as, obviously, there were no parts available for this as yet to be produced vehicle. Instead, he offered Mr Breech his car, determined where Mr Breech would be the next day, and delivered the car as promised.

A week or so later, Bob received a letter, addressed to him as president of Tasca Ford. It was from Ernest Breech detailing the events of that Saturday and asking Bob to “give my thanks to the fat mechanic out back”. This led to a meeting with the “Deuce”, Henry Ford II and a most positive, long‐term relationship between Bob and the top management of the Ford Motor Company. An interesting footnote to this story is that Bob recommended that the Edsel project be canceled. Ford did not listen to him and proceeded to incur the largest single product loss in American business history up to that time.

This anecdote is recorded in some detail as being representative of the many that occur throughout the book. In addition to anecdotes there are maxims and lists of dos and don’ts. For example, “Low price goes away as soon as the customer walks out your door; satisfaction lasts, often for a lifetime” (p. 34) and, “Always service your competitor’s customer” (p. 84).

The following items are extracted from one of many lists of what to do, and what not to do. These are from a list highlighting Bob’s approach to repair service by teams, rather than one mechanic for each job. This list, on page 89, is under the heading: “Team‐Centered Service Payoffs”.

Less space required, lower overhead. Team service can cut in half, or more, the physical space you need to provide customer service; you no longer need one service station per technician.

The average cycle time to complete a job drops dramatically.

While the primary audience for this book is other automobile dealers; its message of “Excellent service, first and always” would benefit all businesses. While no intellectual challenge, this easy, and occasionally fun‐to‐read book would benefit many consumers if more sellers practiced what Bob Tasca preaches.