Make It Easier to Save the Trees

When I see signs like this asking me to be green in one way or another, I'm very willing to comply.

So when I saw the sign I looked all around the restroom, but didn't see any hand dryers except for the paper dispenser in front of my face.

I didn't see anything near the water faucets or on the other walls in the room, so I pulled out a few paper towels and dried my hands. I put the paper towels in the garbage along with all the others, and then when I headed out of the restroom, I saw the hand dryers in the hallway. I didn't notice them on the way in because that wasn't the main thing on my mind at the time.

Are you with me here?

One of the first rules of good design is to keep things where they're going to be used most, and this is especially important in public places. I didn't even see the hand dryer until after I dried my hands. I wonder whose idea it was to install them around the corner in the hallway? McCarran needs to hire new restroom designers who understand the needs of travelers.

I was pulling luggage on wheels. The last thing I wanted to do was to grab my luggage with wet hands and start looking around for hand dryers. If this had been several years ago, I might have sent one of my kids off for this game of hide & seek.

The partially bubbled bumper sticker on the paper towel dispenser is a clue that the hand dryers were probably an afterthought, installed after management at the airport decided to take efforts to be more green. The bubbles in the bumper sticker also whisper out a lack of concern for quality by the person who installed it.

I suppose it's better to have the hand dryers in the hallway than not to have them at all. Maybe the employees know about them and use them. But they're sort of in the way in the hallway. Although there wasn't a line when I used the restroom, I'm sure the dryers are inconveniently placed if people are entering and exiting the restroom with luggage while some people are standing around drying their hands. This seems like it's designed to create a traffic jam.

If McCarran wanted to encourage people to use the hand dryers, they'd be the choice closest to the sinks. I just checked out the McCarran website and I didn't see anything on their "GREEN Initiatives." Since they screamed out "GREEN" on their bumper sticker, I thought they'd have a quick link to "GREEN Initiatives" on their website, but if it's there, I couldn't find it.

On a green design scale of 1-10, I give them a 3: one point for the bubbled bumper sticker, one point for installing the hand dryers and one more point for good luck next time I'm in Vegas.

If you're a member of the American Restroom Association or the World Toilet Organization can you please spread the word that McCarran might have a few underused hand dryers that they can donate to a good cause?

Interested in flying through greener airports? Plan your next trip around a long layover at one of the World's Ten Greenest Airports.

Got an airport story you want to share? Please leave a comment.

Eat Every Opinion With Respect

Today I had the chance to stop by a Fresh & Easy store in Las Vegas. I'm the type of person who always reads the "writing on the wall." My eye is naturally drawn to the written word, especially when it has been edited by a comedian.


What might a designer do to avoid this issue in the future?

• Put the writing on the wall much higher
• Paint the sentences on the wall instead of using glue-on letters
• Be prepared to handle repairs immediately as needed
  

Personally, I think writing on a wall is a super design idea not only for Fresh & Easy, but for any business. So don't avoid it, just look for better ways to get the font on the plaster. It's a great way to display company values or to send subliminal messages to all the readers who enter the space.

I wonder if the company who sold them the letters provided installment instructions or suggestions for optimal use?

Go any other ideas about writing on the wall? Leave your comment here. I believe in eating every opinion with respect.

Starbucks and Target Are Good Places "To Go"

Ever get frustrated in a public restroom? You aren't the only one. Starbucks and Target are good places to go because they have in place excellent restroom policies and cleaning procedures. Despite their good intentions, however, you will LOL with these customer experiences.

Check out this "Gotta Go" video presented by Dr Lorraine Haataia at the Toastmasters International District 84 Division A Area 11 Humorous Speech Contest on September 24, 2009.

If you'd like to book Dr Lorraine for your next event, please contact her at www.DrLorraine.net. She's not always so funny. She's serious about helping businesses establish good policies and procedures that keep customers coming and going.

If you have other humorous public restroom stories you'd like to share, please leave a comment.

Vandalism Strikes on Poor Landscape Design

In a suburb neighborhood with miles of green grass lining the roads, you're bound to have an occasional immature driver who wants to show off the abilities of his four wheel drive.

The members of the homeowner's association (HOA) who oversee the landscaping in Julington Creek Plantation in St. Johns County, FL, think it's a good idea to advertise the fact that the HOA is going to pay the lawn maintenance company to replace the sod every time this happens. And they want the hundreds of homeowners who drive by this to experience a moment of frustration and loss as they head back to their nice safe homes in the suburbs. Maybe the HOA is hoping that parents will go home and scold their innocent teens.

Every day, a small army of men and women from Nanak's Landscaping arrives to mow miles of grass, trim miles of shrubs, and weed countless flower beds in this large planned development. The homeowners pay for this costly recurring service.

The sign confirms that the HOA is dedicated to keep doing things the way they've been doing them for the past decade. Instead of thinking of more sustainable ways to manage the landscaping, they're going to buy sod and pay Nanak's to make the grass look like new again.

There is no real corrective action on this incident, just an advertisement of the obvious--someone ran off the road. A corrective action would involve adjusting the landscape design to reduce the number of "tear up the grass" incidents, and the cost of repairing them. No problem has been resolved by this sign.

Given the current state of the economy, it would make much more sense if the HOA and its paid vendors focused more time figuring out what landscaping modifications can be made to make the neighborhood landscaping more sustainable and reduce the overall maintenance costs for the customers they serve. I encourage Nanak's and other large landscaping companies to become ISO 14001 certified to demonstrate their commitment to sustainability.

Be careful what signs you post. They often say much more than you intend. If you're interested in finding a long term solution to a recurring problem, or if you're interested in ISO 14001 Environmental Management System certification, contact Dr Lorraine.

If you're aware of other similar issues with signs or greenscaping, please feel free to post a comment. I'd like to hear your story.

Shop and Go is a Clean Experience at Target

If you're out shopping and you need a restroom break, Target is a good place to stop.

Target's outstanding clean restroom policy and procedure is clearly posted for both employees and customers to see.  They really hit the bulls eye on this one. The policy sign posted for customers includes a literal "call to action," to call the team leader if the restroom is unacceptable. I wonder if this means I can call them about the little boy who looked up at me from under the next stall while his mother was busy talking on her cell phone? Nevermind, I was just kidding. Talking on cell phones probably makes shopping a more pleasant experience for moms.

The employee checklist entitled, "Restrooms are Clean," includes subheadings of "spotless, stocked and shiny." The form also provides two simple steps for employees to perform every hour: 1) check when the task is performed, and 2) press the call button when done to alert the manager that cleaning is complete. It's obvious that Target is serious about keeping their restrooms clean all day long.

At the Target in St. John's Town Center in Jacksonville, FL, on June 20, 2009, the restroom was clean and stocked. In no way does this guarantee that all Target restrooms on all days are as clean as this one, but you probably have a better shot at a clean restroom at a Target than at a nearby gas station.

So I'll give Target 7  points on a 10 point scale for their restroom policy and procedures. Here's how they could earn the extra three points in my book:

1. one more point if the restrooms had windows and/or more fresh air circulation and live plants.
2. one additional point if it included natural aromatherapy for clean nontoxic air.
3. one more point if they played pleasant jazz or instrumental music not only in the restroom, but throughout the store.

The red all over the store is a bit much and I think they can learn a few things from Walmart's newer energy-efficient stores with natural lighting in the ceiling. But this is just one customer's opinion.

Free Things You Don't Want When Shopping

Seems like there's always a catch to free offers. It's always a good idea to read the fine print before saying yes to free stuff.

I saw this sign today in a clothing consignment store. It gave me a good idea about how this establishment feels about its customers. Although I found it somewhat offensive, I was also impressed with the layout and simplicity of it. It's eye-catching and it communicates a clear message.

What I'd like suggest to this store is that they ask the police to give first time offenders a free ride to a Scared Straight program that's set up as a daily or weekly event hosted by local prisoners. Convicts have the power not only to take lives, but also to save them. Check out this Scared Straight clip . . .

If you care about your community enough to sell them clothes, go the extra mile and take care of the few who come in looking for something else. Who knows, you might turn their life around and turn them into upstanding customers.

Walgreens May Lose Customers Who Can Spell

According to Gallup's Honesty/Ethics in Professions survey, a pharmacist is the second most trusted professional in the United States, falling just behind nurses who take first place.

Ironically, the third most trusted professional is a high school teacher who could help the druggists correct the spelling on this sign I saw posted at Walgreens on Old St. Augustine Road in Jacksonville, Florida, on May 12, 2009.

As a former English professor myself, a mini-alarm goes off in my brain when I see a misspelling on a business sign. It's an advertisement that someone didn't pay attention to details. It amazes me that the store manager didn't notice! The company who made the sign didn't catch the error! The installers didn't catch it. And the pharmacists who show up for work every day aren't doing anything about this sign.

What they mean to say is that they want to ensure parking for their customers. They certainly aren't insuring parking!

Is anyone else out there concerned about this type of oversight? If you pick up a prescription at Walgreens, you want to pick up right drug. We all want to trust the pharmacist to type the correct name of the drug, and put the right pills in the right little bottle with the right instructions.

If you're investing in signs and would like a second opinion about wording to avoid possible misinterpretations, contact Dr Lorraine at www.DrLorraine.net.

Got other sign stories you'd like to share? Feel free to leave a comment.

Ten Great Reasons to Stall Your Advertising

Most people who see an advertisement in a restroom stall or urinal are likely to read it because they have at least a few seconds to spare and they're compelled to read just about anything in front of them, even graffiti.

In the image below you see several colorful examples from Midwest Indoor Advertising:

 

Here are ten reasons you should consider advertising in your restrooms (a.k.a. indoor advertising):

1. Entertain while building brand recognition.
2. Target men or women of specific age groups.
3. Hold audience captive for 30 seconds or more, longer than most other forms of advertising.
4. Get your message through to the young, the affluent, to those who are out spending.
5. Offer phone numbers, calendar events or web sites that people can enter directly into their PDA on the spot.
6. Reach specific geographic locations.
7. Provide compelling news or facts that motivate reader to take action.
8. Capture people when they don't mind taking the time to read, unlike telemarketing, web site pop-up windows, emails, and other less appealing forms of advertising.
9. Customize your ads to suit a number of target markets.
10. Utilize this cost-effective form of advertising in your restrooms even if you don't do it anywhere else.

If you're interested in finding an ad agency who can help you with indoor marketing, see IBAA's membership directory:
Indoor Billboard Advertising Association Membership Directory

Even if you don't have a big budget to advertise outside your business, consider placing ads for upcoming events or specials in your own restrooms. Kaibo Restaurant, Beach Bar and Marina at Rum Point in Grand Cayman hung framed cork boards on the back of their stall doors. Although they would look better if they were centered on the door, some signage is better than none. The off-center would, however, make more sense if the hooks were moved more to the right so that a hanging purse, beach bag or towel wouldn't cover the sign.

The font on the Kaibo sign below is too small. They should say less with bigger font and with more attractive graphics.

The small font on April Events Calendar from REI shown below could also minimize the impact of their message. It would make more sense to advertise specific events with eye-catching photos in the stalls and place a larger calendar someplace else where people can read all the details. It would also be easier to keep the calendar more updated where the past weeks rolled off and only the upcoming four weeks were shown. I took this photo on April 27, a time when most of the April events were obsolete.

If you aren't utilizing indoor advertising and need advice on designing a customer communication strategy for your business, contact Lorraine@DrLorraine.net.

If you have more ideas about best practices for indoor advertising, feel free to share your comments.

Two Feedback Questions are Better Than Thirty Six

My intent in providing feedback is to help organizations better understand how customers experience their product and service offerings. Most leaders and managers have blind spots they don’t even know about. In addition, many people are uncomfortable with genuine feedback, so they find ways around it. They collect examples to support their own desires. And they gather excuses to avoid the things they don’t want to deal with. For leaders who are open to change and growth, I provide just one opinion that they may or may not find helpful.

I arrived at Lake Yale Baptist Conference Center (LYBCC) after dark on Friday, so my first impression was that it was a difficult place to find. Their directions from Jacksonville told me to come via SR-40. After I turned onto SR-40, I saw a sign that said Road closed 11 miles ahead, local traffic only. This didn't bother me. I justified that I would drive slow through the road construction and act like local traffic. Ten miles later, I came to another sign that provided one more important detail: Bridge closed, local traffic only. Bridge closed! Why didn't they mention this 10 miles ago? Why didn't MapQuest tell me this several hours ago?

Over the years I've become an expert at getting myself out of being lost. So I came prepared with my Florida map. I drove off the side of the road and pulled my reading glasses out of my luggage. When I was younger I didn't need the reading glasses step, but now I do. I studied the map and found out how I was going to go around this bridge closure. Here I was on a very dark night on the back country road in central Florida. I was disappointed with MapQuest, with LYBCC, with road construction procedures and with myself for not having gotten the memo about the bridge closure.

I was already on a tight schedule and now I was certain to be late for the Friday-night keynote speaker. But I had a conversation with myself, saying that I could get the notes, have lunch with the speaker or hear him at another conference. When I made the first right turn, all I could see in the sky was the moon smiling at me. It was a crescent in the shape of a smile. I felt safe knowing that God was watching over me and giving me yet another life lesson. By now, I was all cheered up, because I realized that I couldn't change what happened. I could only go on with this day from right here, right now. This detour ended up costing me about an extra 45 minutes.

Not only was it a challenge for me to find Lake Yale, but once I did find the property, I drove around turning my car into strange positions on the roads to shine my headlights on the building names trying to figure out how to find my group. The building names were hard to see in the dark.

When I woke up on Saturday morning, I found myself at a serene conference center on a lake. After staying here Friday night and driving around the campus a few times on Saturday, I recognized that there doesn’t seem to be any tight security here. There’s no gate at the entry, no special tags for the cars and no formal check in. Anyone can drive on or off the property with ease.

The breakfast and lunch didn't thrill me, so I ventured off site for a Subway dinner even though it was about 15 miles away. I used a map from the Guest Information notebook to navigate my way to the nearby small town of Eustis. Not only did I want a healthy dinner, but I was also craving a good cup of coffee with cream. All they served here was weak coffee with fake flavored and sugared creamers. I don’t like that stuff! I also don’t like this coffee addiction I have, especially when I’m on the road. Sooner than later, I must do something about it, but not today.

So I ventured out and got a Starbucks doppio espresso with doppio shots of hot water. This satisfied my coffee craving. As I sipped on my espresso doppio, I did a bit of reflection on my personal vision and mission. I love thinking through things or writing as a caffeine buzz kicks in. Then I went to Subway--you can always count on them for a quick healthy sandwich.

Back at LYBCC on Saturday evening when our conference room was too cold, I was able to use a phone on the wall in the in the entry of the education building to call for assistance. I called and got an answering service. This didn’t give me a lot of confidence about how quickly we would get heat, but to my surprise, we got help within minutes. The message got through quickly and a staff member adjusted the thermostat within a few minutes. He must have been here on site and responded to a page right away. The quick response time was impressive.

LYBCC really has an opportunity that they’re missing. Early on Saturday, I checked the times for their café & bookstore. They were only open from 2-4:30 PM on Saturday. I saw a lot of people walking around campus and surely these people would want to buy a coffee or other food if there were good options in the café. In addition, the café is separate from the cafeteria. Since both relate to food and coffee and people may want to eat or linger beyond cafeteria hours, I think they ought to combine the café with the cafeteria. I recognize that they would have to set up some good procedures to make it work and do some renovations, but I believe it would be to their benefit.

The cafeteria has a view of the lake, but the café doesn’t. The café only had a few unhealthy quick food options. Neither the cafeteria nor café offered a good cup of coffee with cream. Why call it a café? The cafeteria salad bar at lunch was pretty good. They offered several vegetables, but the blue cheese dressing wasn't the greatest. The drink lines weren’t set up efficiently. The Styrofoam cups were placed right in the middle of a combination drink and condiment stand.

People bottlenecked at the drink/condiment stand, trying to get a coffee or hot chocolate and then step sideways through others in line so they could make their way to the creamers and stirs. People were stirring their coffee while others were reaching across them for ketchup. Since none of the staff asked my opinion about their assembly line, I didn't say anything. This is the don't ask and don't tell principle in action. This would be a good project for a college student wanting to become a process specialist.

The dining hours were limited to one hour and I don’t mind that so much, as long as the food is good and they can get people through the lines quickly. I liked how the lines formed inside the building rather than outside. Last October I went to the LifeWay Glorieta Conference Center for a writers conference and I remember shivering in line because the doors had to be propped open to accommodate people waiting in line for their food. During some meals the temperature was in the 40s. It made for a very uncomfortable wait. The architects didn't plan to accommodate the long lines at dinner.

The pillows in the LYBCC rooms were all the same—too big and too puffy. I’m petite and my neck was propped up too high. I felt the kink in my neck on Saturday and Sunday mornings. This is the reason that some people travel with their pillows. Maybe I should look into some small travel pillow to solve this issue. I’m constantly trying to reduce the amount of stuff I travel with, however, so I’m not eager to add items to my travel checklist. I think that they ought to have a variety of pillow sizes in each room, or at least offer an extra one or two with less poof. Even if they’re trying to make sure that the bed looks balanced when it’s made, they can provide housekeeping with instructions to put two flat pillows in the middle of the king bed and two poofy ones on the sides. That way it would all balance out. Problem solved! Another way I can solve the problem is to accustom myself to sleeping flat on my back so I never need a pillow anymore. Maybe I'll find some time to read up on this to see what the sleep experts say.

Something else I really didn’t like about the room was the fact that it was somewhat musty and the window was bolted shut. The only way to get air in the room was through the noisy HVAC unit. If the room didn’t have carpeting, but had hard surface flooring instead, it probably wouldn’t hold onto as much dust and odor. Don’t get me wrong, the room was clean on the surface. Other things in the room can carry musty odors as well, such as the mattress, the bedspread, the furnishings and even the walls. On both mornings, I woke up stuffy and my eyes had that squinty red look I get when my allergies are acting up. I often feel this way when I wake up in older hotels with poor ventilation. I slept with the HVAC unit off because I don’t like the noise of a loud fan going all night.

Here are best things I found about LYBCC:

• This is a beautiful property with lake views. Because it’s in central Florida and far from malls and outlets, it really promotes rest and relaxation.
  
• The facilities seem to be well maintained and basic procedures seemed to be quite effective.
  
• Since “Baptist” is in the name, I assume that the facility is backed by the Baptist church and therefore probably has the means to promote and improve the facility for greater maximization of its asset. I noticed a campsite on the property, for example. This mixed use of the property is an innovative idea and provides visitors with options.

So if LYBCC were to improve on a few things, here’s what I’d suggest in order of importance:

1. Enhance the dining experience by doing some or all of the following:
   a. provide outdoor seating with a view of the lake
   b. move the café to the same building as the cafeteria and keep the café open for most of the day so people can buy drinks & snacks during their breaks
   
2. make contact with the people who come on site, give them the option to keep in touch by signing up for a newsletter and/or provide a brochure that they can take back to their church. Some type of front desk check in would probably work best. I spent the weekend here and had very minimal contact with anyone from LYBCC.
   
3. Continuously improve the look & feel of the rooms:
   a. provide a way to freshen up the smell of the room, while minimizing the noise. Hint: the answer is not a deodorizer! The room is often a big part of a person’s first impression at a retreat center.
   b. provide some pillows with less stuffing
   c. add color to warm up the white walls

There’s no question in my mind that LYBCC has put effort into pleasing their visitors. They placed a Guest Information notebook in my room. I had notebook #417 and I was in room#709. These differing numbers indicates to me there’s probably an opportunity for improvement. I visualize a manual inefficient process going on behind the scenes. Because the notebook has so many pages, I imagine that it’s time consuming to go through it after each guest departs, to make sure that any missing pages are replaced.

The notebook included numerous computer-generated pages organized into five categories:
· Emergency Services
· General Information
· Guest Services
· Around the Area
· Comments

It looks like several people have put a lot of effort into doing this research and compiling these pages over time. It does look rather homemade, however, cheapening their effort. I think they would benefit by converting some of this information into more condensed and graphically pleasing brochures to lay out in the rooms. I'm not saying this to harm the organization, but to help the organization. If I thought it looked homemade, it's likely that someone else thought the same thing.

The three-page evaluation form in the last Comments section probably goes unnoticed by most guests. And even if a guest did notice the “Guest Evaluation” form in the Comments section of the notebook, I doubt if many people would complete a three-page form that would take longer to complete than filling out an application for a drivers license. The Guest Evaluation form does, however, provide an instrument for people to communicate to them and they clearly identify all the areas where they’re seeking feedback:

• Office Staff
  
• Housekeepers
  
• Dining room
  
• Groundskeepers
  
• Audio-visual crew
  
• Miscellaneous
  
• Comments

It’s tempting for me to type out this three-page form so you can check it out, but I think the main value in this list is internal, for the benefit of each department head. The questions aren’t numbered, but I counted up 36, not including the option to include additional comments!

They’re organizing the customer’s comments by their departments, rather than how a customer experiences a weekend or week on their property: check-in process, room, conference rooms, dining experience and so on. Their "Guest Evaluation" might be a good checklist for the staff, but I’m certain that if we counted up the number of people who slept at LYBCC in 2007 and the number of people who completed the Guest Evaluation form, I bet we’d discover that less than 5% of the visitors found the form and completed it without any prompting. If people did complete it, it’s probably because their meeting organizer included it in their participant packets and requested them to fill it out. I'm notorious for providing feedback, but this one was so long that I didn't want to fill it out.

One final note about the Guest Information notebook is that it also included the business card of their Director of Guest Services--a bold gesture for any organization. I’ll send her this note and see what happens.

After the conference, I learned that much of the staff here are volunteers who work hard to keep this beautiful facility running. Again, I'm only one opinion, but I believe that that they are achieving their stated mission and they're doing it at an affordable price which provides an open door to many.

How do you know if your mission is translating into the results you want? What are your measures?

Are you open to feedback in the way that your customer wants to give it to you--the way the experience goes for them? Are you sure? Learning to accept feedback takes time. For individuals, it's transforming. For organizations, it's a cultural shift.

Is it worth it to you to work toward getting better and better each day? It's up to you.