Okay, what’s today’s important date in customer relationship history? Multiple guess:
- In 1775, Paul Revere took his legendary midnight ride to warn “The British are coming! The British are coming!”
- In 1857 famous lawyer Clarence Darrow, who lost the Scopes Monkey Trial, was born in Kinsman, Ohio
- In 1906 an earthquake in San Francisco killed 500 people and destroyed 3,000 acres in the heart of the city.
- In 1918 Clifton Keith Hillegass was born in Rising City, Nebraska. You know him as the founder of Cliff’s Notes.
- In 1923 Yankee Stadium opened with an attendance of 74,200 before the fire marshal ordered the gates closed. The Bronx Bombers beat the Boston Red Sox with a three-run Babe Ruth homer. Later, of course, the Yankees would go on to become the first team in baseball history to choke a 3-0 lead in a postseason series and blow the American League Championship Series to the Red Sox.
All key events in American history, no doubt, but for our purposes the significance of today is that in 1934, in Fort Worth, Texas, J.F. Cantrell opened the first laundromat, the Washateria, for people who couldn’t afford washing machines or a laundry. He had four electric washing machines and charged by the hour.
This is, of course, the essence of all great customer relationship management: Find out what the customers want, think outside the box, and provide it for them. Do it the right way, like St. Cantrell did, and you’ll please and delight the customer to no end.
