The Recipe For Making a Customer For Life: Personalization, Quality, and Care

EMILY: I’m Emily Washcovick, Yelp’s Local Business Expert. Every episode I pick one review on Yelp and talk to the entrepreneur and the reviewer about the story and business lessons behind their interactions. Let’s see what’s behind this week’s review.

REGGIE: When you go to the outside of the business, it’s modest. You look at it and you’re like, ‘This is a good looking business.’ When you walk inside that door, you see activity and you see excellence. You have to be a person that really believes in doing your best for that person that you are with or that person that you’re interacting with.

And when I walked in there, it was like flower heaven. It was activity going on. There were long stems, you know, it had to mean something because I remember all this from Mother’s Day to tell you, there were these arrangements that were unique to them that had, you know, preserved flowers, flowers that last forever that’s encased glass. You knew, you walk in there and you’re like, ‘Oh yeah, this, this is the place right here that’s gonna make my wife happy’.

If I wanted cheap, I would’ve went somewhere else. But when I wanted excellence, it was amazing. And you could tell that each person, they were there because they wanted to be there. Even though I knew it was their time, they weren’t looking at the clock like, ‘We gotta get outta here. Could you hurry up? Could you?’ No, they waited and didn’t wanna leave. And I told them, I’m gonna come by here just to speak to you all, when we’re passing through, me and my son.

EMILY: First impressions can really make or break a customer’s experience, and for Boite de Fleur’s customer Reggie, that first impression went above and beyond his expectations, which led to a great review on Yelp. Let’s hear what he wrote.

REGGIE: This is the best place ever. They took the time to treat my son as a king as he picked flowers out to go in his Mother’s Day arrangement. They are gifted, and you will not leave this place disappointed. If you are looking for something with class and custom made, definitely visit this place. This is the best place ever.

EMILY: I love that review. Short and sweet, but it also paints a picture of the skill and customer service that sets the business apart. Reggie and his son had a totally custom and curated experience and that stood out!

Owner Tina started Boite de Fleurs after she came across luxury boxed flower arrangements on social media and realized that there was a lack of anything like that at home in Arizona.

TINA: I’m an avid social media consumer and so I am on social media constantly and I was seeing, you know, there were so many different people that were getting or ordering and receiving these beautiful boxed arrangement flowers, and I felt like I couldn’t find that here.

I’m originally from Chicago and I feel like there wasn’t a lot of glam like I like here in Arizona. In my mind it’s like, well, if I like it, then I’m sure other people are probably gonna want it because I can’t be the only one on social media like watching and looking at these things. And also the few times that I had tried to order some for like my mom and my aunt for Mother’s Day or just any flowers in general, I feel like I wasn’t getting the experience I was hoping for, so that’s what really pushed me to start.

EMILY: I’m a sucker for a good origin story and Tina has one that I feel like a lot of other business owners can relate to. Boite de Fleurs originally started as a side hustle that she worked on while also working a regular job.

TINA: I started in my garage really for about three, almost three years. I was just doing it as a side thing in my garage, and people would order and I’d make ’em and deliver them on my off times from my real job or my regular job.

And you know, right before the pandemic, obviously we didn’t know there was gonna be a pandemic, but that’s when I decided to open a brick and mortar. I signed the lease for this place December, 2019, and I got it ready to open February of 2020, and then a month later the pandemic happened. So it’s been a really big learning experience ‘cause I never thought I would ever be an entrepreneur or a business owner. Going through the pandemic and not really knowing what to expect or even how long it was gonna be and kind of pushing through and, you know, actually having a sustainable business, I feel like for the last, now almost three years has been tough. But it’s been great at the same time because, you know, it’s something that I feel like not a lot of people can say that they’ve done or they’ve gone through because that’s not what we were expecting when we first opened up.

EMILY: Like most small business owners, Tina has seen her fair share of obstacles, including the pandemic. In spite of that, it’s clear that she understands the core of what makes a business successful—the dedication to creating an exceptional customer experience, something that resonated with Reggie both on her social media feed and in person.

REGGIE: And for this business, it was Mother’s Day. It was coming up. And I love to do things that are unusual and out of the box. So I looked there and I saw this business and I saw the arrangements, the pictures that they had, and it really got me. It was like, ‘Okay, they have these individual pictures, they have these main…’, but the pictures are all excellent.

And that spoke to me. So I called the business and I told them, I said, this holiday is coming up, but I have a son who’s one year old. He’s a baby, and I want it to be special. Did you know that when I got there, they had the entire store? No one was in there but me and them. And when I tell you that meant something. When my son walked in there, they catered to him. He picked out each flower that’s in that arrangement. It was memorable. It’s the kinda things that I’ll never buy flowers from anyone else. I don’t care. I won’t get ’em unless I deal with them, but the way they wanted to be in the business. The picture was a true representation of the quality that you got when you got in there. I mean, as he walked around, they took pictures of him and I had this collage of different pictures that they had for me. And you know, that means everything.

EMILY: Tina’s enthusiasm for her business is contagious. It’s easy to see that to her, customers are more than just people who come in for a bouquet or two. That authentic excitement in being able to create such a heartwarming memory for her customer is something so special about Boite de Fleurs.

TINA: To me, just getting the call from him and how excited he was to make sure it was such a special Mother’s Day. To me, nothing else matters. Like the fact that you’re putting in so much work and thought into it… How can I not help you? I mean, it’s the mother of your child, it’s your wife, and you wanna bring your son in to help make it so much more special.

We were so excited when I got the phone call, I was like, this is the cutest thing I’ve ever heard, like, I don’t even know what to do to help you, but we’re gonna do everything we can. And we were just so excited. Even when he walked in, I was like, ‘Oh my God, this is gonna be so great.’ You just feed off of people’s energy and the fact that Reggie wanted to make it so special with Reggie Jr. for his wife. I mean, I don’t know. I think I’m just a sucker and I have such a big family and you know, we always try to make Mother’s Day so great for my own mom. I just love it.

EMILY: Tina’s passion really shows through everything she does to ensure her customer’s satisfaction. Boite de Fleur’s business philosophy revolves around making sure the customer gets exactly what they want, whatever it may be.

TINA: It’s literally just me and my sister and we make everything, you know, per order. Everything is unique to that purchase. And that it’s not like I have a bunch of, you know, arrangements ready to go. Every order that is placed is made specifically for that person. So sometimes it takes us a little bit longer, but we’re not this huge flower business where we can just pump out orders and deliver them within like 10 minutes ‘cause we put a lot of care in, a lot of work into each order because we want to deliver that experience not just ‘Let me place an order online and make sure it gets delivered.’

The reason we’re so unique is we start off making almost all of our arrangements in a box, which is what Boite de Fleurs stands for. In French, it’s ‘Box of Flowers.’ So everything was made in a box and delivered.

Obviously the flowers have sustainable stuff in the box to where they can survive. So we have fresh flowers and preserved flowers, and we make everything curated for the customer who’s ordering it. I mean, if they call in and want something specific, even if it takes us a day or two to make sure we get this correct and exact flowers from our vendors, we make sure we do that because we want to deliver a great experience at the end of the day.

To me, that’s what it’s all about, making sure I can get whatever it is that the customer wants. I just feel like that’s what people want nowadays. Everybody wants something-specific in their mind, whether they’ve seen it online or they’ve seen it somewhere else, or someone else has gotten something.

Especially if it’s different, if it’s not just a dozen red roses in a vase. I mean, they want something different. They want it unique and they want it to be personalized for whoever they’re sending it to. So we also have personalized letters in our flowers and—I don’t know if you’ve seen our website – but we do, if you want an ‘A’ or if, if someone has a big birthday and they want the number 30 or 40 or a big anniversary. And they can pick out the colors of their flowers. It’s not like we just give them one choice and that’s all you get. No, if she likes purple or if he likes blue and that’s the color you want, that’s the color we’re gonna get and get for you. It’s exciting to us when other people are excited. So I feel like what makes us unique is we genuinely care about the experience that we are giving to our customers. Not just the ones purchasing, but also the ones receiving the arrangement because they’re ultimately the end customer.

EMILY: With a perishable product like flowers, quality control can be a bit tricky — and maintaining that quality can mean higher prices than some competitors. But Tina knows her customers, and she knows they’re willing to take on the expense for a better experience.

TINA: When you personalize anything, I think that always, usually comes at a higher price point, I feel like. So when you’re getting that personalized experience, the personalized box, we tend to source our flowers from our vendors at a higher quality. So to get higher quality, me, myself, personally, I would rather pay for something if it’s nicer quality and make sure it lasts and make sure I get what I want than skimping on it or going with someone that’s, you know, a little bit less and not getting what I want, not getting the experience of what I want, and ultimately whoever I’m getting it for is not happy as well. Because if I’m ordering flowers, I wanna make sure the person receiving them is happy with them. And they’re never going to usually tell you, ‘No, I don’t like them they’re ugly, or they’re dying.’ Or, you know, ‘That’s not my favorite color or my birthday was yesterday, but I guess the flowers got here today.’ So we want to make sure that we produce that same excitement for that customer who’s receiving it as the person who’s placing the order and everybody in between.

So to me it’s like I just would rather make sure I put out a good product. And if that means I have to spend a little more to do it, I’m okay doing that. Because I know at the end, the end result will be exactly what I want and exactly what we talked about.

EMILY: Reggie loved the final product, but that’s not what made him a customer for life. It was the excellent customer experience and personalized attention that will keep him coming back.

REGGIE:  When I got there, they were prepared and I mean they had, all of them looked like they were really great with kids and that was unusual. I mean, they took him and kneeled over and smelled something and they would talk to him and they would say ‘That one.’ And he would look at ’em and they got that one. And they showed me where to put him on the table, which would make a great picture. They gave me an experience and they gave him an experience.

You, you don’t find that everywhere. And it was to try to make the connection. They were seeing what he identified with Coco Mellon, so they were putting things on little screens where he could watch it and I mean, it was, it was just excellent—the music, the atmosphere. I would tell anyone if you didn’t call me or contact me, this is what I would tell anyone in the street. If you want flowers, go there. I can’t say enough about it, but that experience, like this is, you know, my son right here, you see and you know, and he means everything to me but that experience is second to none. I’ll never forget it. Every time I look at a picture that came from there where he’s bending over and he’s smelling the flowers, I get emotional and I mean, it tears me up. And they did that. And I’ll never forget that.

EMILY: Of course, no matter how hard a business owner tries to meet their customer’s expectations, there are instances where things don’t pan out the way both sides hoped and a critical review is posted. Even though it hurts, it’s also an inevitable part of owning a business.

TINA: Getting a 1-star review, I feel like it hurts your soul when you try to put so much into your business. I mean, everybody can give us 5-star reviews all day long, and I am so appreciative of all of them, Reggie included.

But then you get the one that dampens your whole mood and you try to say, ‘Oh, I’m not gonna pay attention to it. It’s okay. I’ll respond and I know I did my best.’ Everybody’s entitled to their own opinion, but you want to do better as a business owner. There’s always room for improvement, so that 1-star review, even if it’s there, even if you have thousands of 5-star reviews, you want to learn from the 1-star review. So that’s kind of what we do. Me and my sister, we talk about it and like, ‘How do we fix this moving forward?’ Because we don’t want to continue getting that kind of criticism. You want to fix it. Someone told you there’s a problem and now we fix it and move forward from it.

I try to respond to everybody that leaves a review because customer service is really big, good or bad. People are gonna talk about you, and it’s either gonna be on Yelp or any other platform, and you want to make sure everybody understands the vision that you’re trying to portray in your business, which is excellent customer service. Whether they had a good experience or they didn’t, you want to always make sure that you are following up with them or someone to make sure that you kind of get your point across and make sure that they understand.

EMILY: Reviews are one way customers can feel like they are being heard, whether it’s through constructive criticism or glowing appreciation, and when an owner replies to reviews, it gets noticed—by the reviewer as well as other potential customers.

REGGIE: I have a thing where if I can’t say anything good about you, I don’t say it at all, unless it’s a safety concern or something that has to go. But you kinda know, Yelp is like with everything, it’s like clients or the business owners are the celebrities.

So when the celebrity reaches back out to you to say, ‘Hey, that meant a lot,’ that encourages you to keep responding to, to keep writing, that what you do, it matters. And when I saw that, it felt like, ‘Okay, that’s my family right there,’ we had such a connection, and to see Tina with that reply, it was awesome.

EMILY: The idea of business owners being a sort of celebrity to reviewers is a really interesting take. According to Tina, that’s exactly why it’s important for her to reply to every single review she receives, especially the more critical ones.

TINA: It was my friend Tanya, she’s the one that told me because at first. I didn’t wanna respond because I didn’t know how to. I mean you get it, it builds up inside you and you don’t know how to respond.

You’re like, ‘Well, I know I don’t want to say, you know, some of the things I’m thinking so I need to think about what I’m gonna say. And then you just kind of don’t respond because you don’t know. And she was like, ‘No, you have to respond. You have to respond to the good and the bad.’

And she was like, ‘You have to think about it. And you have to understand that what you’re gonna say, people are gonna read. and you don’t wanna come off like you’re not trying to fix it or you’re just kind of brushing it off. Because most, anytime we’ve gotten a bad review, we’ve talked to the customer. We’ve talked to them, but our vision just doesn’t align with what their expectation is.

Sometimes, I mean, at the end of the day, I’m running a business and I have to make sure that I’m sustaining my life. So sometimes the things that they want and the things that we’re able to provide don’t, you know, equal the same thing, even though we’ve tried and we’ve tried and, you know, I can’t just keep giving things out for free most of the time. And unfortunately, that’s what some people always go for. So I try to talk to the customers, call them, email them, respond to their reviews, you know, even if it’s on Yelp or Instagram or wherever it is, because I just don’t want people to think like we’re ignoring them.

EMILY: And that concludes our episode! Be sure to subscribe so you get new episodes every Thursday. I hope you enjoyed it and were able to take a thing or two away to implement in your own life. Whether it’s a new idea that you can bring back to your business, or a fresh perspective on how to be a positive influence as a consumer, we share these stores to inspire and create more meaningful connections in your local community. For more information about today’s business, or to connect with me check out the show notes!