Back in 2015, a mother calls Tampa International Airport (TPA) about her son’s stuffed tiger. But rather than just picking it up and tossing it into lost and found, one employee goes above and beyond. He takes the tiger and went around the entire airport photographing the toy, and proceeded to make a book for the child when he returned. Little deeds like that show us as consumers that big companies like TPA truly care about your patronage. And it is a very big reason they deserve it. They performed exceptionally well to accommodate a disgruntled customer, and ensure that the issue was taken care of appropriately.
Looking at the social experience, you could say it was a huge success. Not only was the issue addressed when the customer returned, but they added an incentive to reassure the child that everything was okay. Although that the story book was never needed, it was a thoughtful and generous gesture of goodwill that is needed in every workplace environment. But not only at a workplace, but everywhere in general. We could all learn form that employee, to make this place a better one for all of us to live and be a part of.
If you were to look at their social media page you would see that they waited for the family to make the first move. They simply replied thanks, but not long after that it sparked a whole movement, where their act of kindness became a huge headline of a story. It even picked up overseas in areas such as Germany, France, Switzerland, New Zealand, and more. On their page that story was shared among 3,000,000 people, each of which supported the story, and nearly 100,000 people had an impression on that. It also sparked up different stories of how TPA was really kid friendly, with one father saying how his child still has the plane that was given to him by one of their employees.
If believe that everyone would agree that nothing different would of or could of happened to make that experience more “efficient.” The airline did the right thing by staying out of it and letting the customer and employee speak about what happened. They let the story build from the outside through the eyes of the thankful parents. That whole move set set in motion their national and international recognition among future and past customers.
As for now TPA is giving constant updates on their Facebook and Twitter page. They allow for recommendations and reviews from any and all consumer. They have updates on events that is taking place at their airport. Like a few days ago they hosted Busch Gardens in one of their terminals, where you can spin the wheel to win tickets to Busch Gardens, they even had a sloth there to brighten everyone’s day.
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