Today I had an interesting experience at Subway. Standing in the queue for a quick sandwich, I observed the sandwich artist creating great sandwiches. The people in front of me had ordered variety of meat sandwiches. The sandwich artist was using her hands (with gloves, of course) to handle the meat.

I am a vegetarian due to religious reasons. So, when it was my turn I politely requested her to change the gloves. The response I got from her baffled me. She said “There are a lot of people (there were 3 people) behind you. If you want, you can wait at the end of the line. I won’t change my gloves because it takes a long time”

I smiled and just let this pass. It is unfortunate that the person could not take 10 seconds to honor a customer’s request.

An employee’s attitude represents a company’s attitude to the customer. So, if you don’t take care of hiring great customer facing people, you will provide a great sandwich and still leave a bad taste 🙁