Give em the Pickle

Customer service is a noble profession and Bob Farrell is the world's number one ambassador of this quickly vanishing art. In Give em the Pickle Bob inspires us to passionate customer service. Bob's wit and wisdom have made him one of the most sought after speakers in the corporate world and his training video has quickly become a staple in thousands of company's customer service training programs.

Bob Farrell is a wonderfully engaging speaker who tells story after story each one more inspiring and funny than the next. In one story he tells us about ripping a pen off of the chain in a bank. In another he has an entire restaurant sing happy birthday to a child. In a third he talks about the children in his granddaughter's class getting rude treatment on an airline and then having her Grandpa tell 30,000 people about it in speaking engagements. In every case, Bob finds a way to motivate and entertain like no other. Most customer service videos tell you the basic nuts and bolts of service, but they fail to inspire and unless your employees are inspired the effect of a customer service program will be short lived.

Bob coined the phrase Give em the Pickle early in his career. A customer was charged 75 cents for an extra pickle and wrote Farrell about how disappointed he was about it. Bob was appalled by this and realized that he needed a better way to communicate his customer service philosophy to his employees. So Bob made it his customer service battle cry - Give em the Pickle! Every day he asked his employees to give pickles - find those simple extra things that make customers happy. Whether it's to give an actual pickle, singing a child happy birthday or even an extra effort to smile. Everything counts and everything helps. If it makes the customer feel good about themselves and your company - then it's a pickle. Later in his career when Bob was waiting for a plane he ran into the same gentleman who had complained about the pickle. Bob was able to thank him for inspiring the philosophy that drove the success of his ice cream parlor chain.

Give em the Pickle! Employees will remember the phrase and be inspired to find pickles in their in their own jobs - Simple little things that will make people happy and keep them coming back. Give em the Pickle is hard to forget and for years to come, people will remember this simple little phrase and be motivated by it. Bob Farrell is truly an inspiring service ambassador.