American business used to take pride in doing a job well
done. I grew up watching TV commercials of the poor, bored Maytag repairman who
had to sit around with nothing to do because Maytag washers and dryers rarely
broke down. Then, American corporations were struck by the epiphany that if
they built products so well then consumers would wait a long time before
purchasing new ones. When a new product was introduced to the market,
manufacturers sought to stress quality and reliability. But as the potential
pool of customers shrank once everyone in the country had one of those
newfangled washing machines or televisions or VCRs, manufacturers realized
their dilemma. They had succeeded too well. Now the goal was no longer to make
sure every American purchased their product; the new goal was repeat business.
For many years, manufacturers rolled out the marketing
mantra “New and Improved” as a way to encourage consumers to part with their
hard-earned cash to replace something they already owned with something quite
similar, but tweaked a little. Of course, “New and Improved” is an oxymoron:
one cannot improve something unless it already exists, and if it already exists
then it’s not new. The marketing mavens would spice up the ad copy
with a snappy name like “Zylofabro” as the new ingredient or mechanical process
that had been added to the staid product. And for many years, it worked.
But as the economy hit a downturn and the American Dream now
required two wage earners, consumers became more skeptical. Did we really need “Zylofabro”
added to our product that we had been assured for years by the same
manufacturers was so wonderful, and which we had survived so well without?
Marketing wasn’t going to cut it. Manufacturers needed a new
way to get American consumers to replace their existing products. It was a
dilemma, but the bottom line was at stake. They thought long and hard,
brainstorming until finally they devised what had been the obvious solution all
along: planned obsolescence. In other words, stop making high quality products
built to last. Establish a limited lifecycle for each product and build it only
to last the length of that lifecycle.
What a great lesson for our kids: don’t try so hard and aim
for a shoddy result. At least the Maytag repairman would be kept busy, you
might think. But no, the manufacturers had that covered too. Their new mantra
was “Replace, not repair”. Take my Epson printer, for example. One day, it just
stopped working. I couldn’t find anything wrong with it, but I got an error
message which I looked up online. It turns out, Epson had coded software to
make the machine stop functioning after it had printed a certain number of
copies. There was no way to override the software, just as there was nothing
wrong with the machine; Epson had merely decided it was time for me to buy a new
printer by setting an arbitrary finite lifecycle and enforcing it through
software.
When my dryer broke, I asked the repairman if I should
replace it. After all, it was 24 years old and had served me well. He pointed
to a part inside the dryer. “See that metal piece? It’s plastic in all the new
dryers. Plastic will last five, maybe eight years and then you’ll find yourself
buying a new dryer.” Planned obsolescence. I kept the dryer and repaired it instead.
That was seven years ago; it still works and hasn’t had a repair since.
My washing machine of similar vintage broke two weeks ago. When
I say broke, I mean the connection on the circuit board that turns on the
machine when the “Start” button is pushed needs to be replaced. The rest of the
washing machine, including all the other circuit buttons, is in perfect working
order. When it was manufactured 31 years ago, it was made to last. All it needs
is a minor repair. But even a minor repair is not a straightforward proposition
when it comes to modern American business.
Since several of my appliances had joined in a mutual
suicide pact that weekend, I decided to contact a repair service to see if they
could be brought back to life. I prefer to repair rather than replace them
because the newer models are built with planned obsolescence and will only last
five-to-eight years, whereas these models were solidly built and have lasted me
more than 30 years. So I found a local appliance repair service listed on Yelp that amazingly had two full pages of nothing but five-star reviews from customers. I emailed them Sunday night, and when I hadn't heard back from them I started calling them at 9 on Monday morning. No one picked up their phone despite the recording that they would reopen at nine on Monday. So I continued calling back, every ten minutes, until after 12:30. It's one thing to be short-staffed and away from the phone, but not for four and a half hours. I'm scratching my head wondering how this business could have received two full pages of nothing but five-star reviews when they don't even answer their damn phone.
Meanwhile, I needed to replace my computer, too. I found one
online and was ready to order but I had one question to resolve first. The
memory was upgradable so I wanted to know if I could purchase the unit with the
full upgraded memory. I submitted the question on the website's form. It was a
yes or no question from a customer ready to commit to a purchase as soon as the
answer was received. No one got back to me for 36 hours… and when they finally
responded, the answer was an automated reply “we can't process that request.”
What is wrong with American businesses that they are so
unresponsive to customers trying to pay them for their services or products?
I attempted to call the company but it was ten minutes after
5 o'clock and they had closed. So I called them today before five... And was
informed my wait time would be 51 minutes. When I finally reached a human
being, she answered my question. However, the price on the website had now
increased by $20. By waiting to receive accurate information before making the
purchase, and because I could not decipher their cryptic response, the company
would financially penalize me if I bought its product. Let’s review the
American business model: don’t respond to customer questions in a timely
manner; when you do respond, make it a cryptic automated response; put the
customer on hold for nearly an hour; and raise the price while he’s waiting.
I ended up buying the computer; however, I immediately
received a text from my credit card company asking me if I did, in fact, use my
credit card to make that purchase, and to reply with 1 for “Yes” or 2 for “No”.
So I replied with “1” and instantly received another text back that said “Thanks.
The transaction was not completed. If you want to make the purchase with this
card, have the merchant reprocess the transaction.”
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