Giving Clientele a Break From Your Services

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 I loved this Taipei restaurant from the first meal there; so, naturally, I was disappointed to find it closed when I went back the next day, around 2 PM, instead of 11 AM. Four bucks for a multi-course meal, with all the chocolate and maple walnut ice cream and iced tea I could consume, buffet style, to fight the Taiwan summer sweats.

I soon realized that the closing was a daily affair and the equivalent of a Mexican siesta break—presumably for the staff, to get a respite from the post-lunch sweltering kitchen heat, before reopening in the late afternoon.

But on reflection it seems equally obvious that the afternoon break accommodates another likely reality: fewer potential customers roaming the broiling streets, which would partially explain why even air-conditioned establishments, like the one shown, shut down after breakfast and lunch.

More recently, however, I’ve also entertained the possibility that shutting down services temporarily, on a daily basis, can, as a consequence or objective, also give the clientele a break, a respite much-needed, desired or otherwise worthwhile, yet be good for business.

Shutting down for part of the hottest part of the day reduces the risk of setting up a negative association between your service and unpleasant heat, while encouraging patrons to show up when getting to and being in your establishment is more comfortable and rewarding, as a total “gestalt”.

Even though “clientele breaks” may, as a general concept, seem counter-intuitive, I offer the following justifications (some more fanciful than others) for shutting down services as a temporary break for, as well as from or in the absence of customers and clients, illustrated with concrete examples:

Bars can offer “unhappy hour”a no-drinks-served period in the evening, say, between 11 PM and midnight, which allows patrons a chance to sober up and decide whether or not to have another drink “for the road” and risk a DUI charge or accident on the way home. Like kids denied a dangerous toy, the patrons may eventually come to appreciate the wisdom and concern of the bar management.

I recall a tour guide’s story about bars in 19th-century Dublin coincidentally closing around the same time as sewage, sludge and raw garbage were traditionally dumped from ghetto windows onto the narrow lanes below: around 10 PM.

To me that combination seemed like a public service that might cut short what would otherwise be an over-extended evening of drinking or that, through Pavlovian conditioning and unpleasantness of sewage-soaked hair and clothes, make public intoxication, brawling and alcoholism less rampant.

-Breaks from non-stop, otherwise repeated and intrusive advertising: Japanese supermarkets, Taiwanese street vendors, “free” movie sites and even the Daily Show use barrage advertising with looped recorded ads, repeated live sales pitches, endless pop-up online ads and other forms of seamless, overdone repetition that defy the principles of effective behavioral and attitudinal conditioning.

For example, the Daily Show has, at times, looped its ads in sets of threes, e.g., its past, utterly lame “Big Bang Theory” series promos—back-to-back during or before show breaks and for every Daily Show episode viewed.

Some Japanese supermarkets will, during the entire day, loop the same blaring, grating ad announcing, for example, specials. Street vendors in Taiwan bark the same spiel, word-for-word, over and over again, like chanting, desperate monks.

This kind of advertising saturation-bombing makes little to no sense, since repetition without pause is especially likely to backfire when what is being repeated is also being resisted or rejected as annoying or otherwise unwanted. (Mobs endlessly chanting slogans are different, because their members are emotionally endorsing the message.)

Moreover, the credibility and impact of many messages are diminished by repetition—as any over-excited guy who has told a woman “You’re so beautiful!” one or more times too many can attest.

-In the advertising domain, giving clientele a break between ads is smart with exceptions, the chief one being the case in which the ad host is contracted to place the ad a certain number of times per unit time.

This contractual obligation is more easily met by seamlessly repeating the ad in an available time slot, especially if, for any reason, the hosting service has fallen behind schedule.

However, this unusual instance aside, repeated and disruptive ads, e.g., pop-up pages triggered by selecting a movie on a movie site or supermarket looped-tape ads, are virtually certain to only antagonize, rather than entice, customers (while stressing out any employees forced to watch or listen to them throughout their entire shifts).

-Recruiter lunchtime shutdown: This allows job applicants the opportunity to actually use their lunch hour for lunch, rather than skipping it and skipping out to have an interview or otherwise meet with a recruiter who’s gobbled a 7-11 bag of Doritos at his desk in order to be available.

That break will help ensure job seekers’ (as well as recruiters’) proper nutrition and diminish the risk of the job seekers’ returning to their jobs late, because of crosstown traffic. The healthier regimen may, in the long run, fortify all concerned for the physical and mental challenges of job and candidate hunting.

Super-conscientious, desperate or eager recruiters can tack on an extra hour at the end or beginning of the day to accommodate applicants who wanted to come at lunchtime.

22-hour McDonald’s: Around-the-clock fast-food operations, like 24-hour McDonald’s operations, could shut down between 3 AM and 5 AM, to discourage homelessness, vagrancy and bad sleep posture,

Religious breaks: “Keeping the Sabbath” and other religiously-motivated service suspensions, e.g., daily prayers, can be interpreted as encouragement of clientele to meet their religious obligations and expectations, or enjoy the associated opportunities, e.g., for a religious festival. This can benefit the temporarily suspended service, as a display of solidarity with and respect for the faith.

School summer vacation: There’s no need to elaborately explain how this can pay off in terms of energizing and refreshing student clientele, even if temporarily at the expense of motivation.

-Legal services prep-hour: Lawyers might make potential clients wait an extra hour in the reception area to encourage them to reflect on whether they really need a lawyer. This could work to the lawyers’ advantage by reducing the number of visitors looking for either a freebie consultation or those who do not perform due diligence in determining whether they really need a lawyer.

To facilitate this, the hour could be disguised and packaged as a visitor “research and prep period”, a non-billable time set aside for reflection and investigation, before needlessly taking up time of both parties. The lawyers could still work seamlessly, merely by showing up one hour later than the first clients or by doing other billable work during that hour.

Patient self-instruction time: Physicians and clinics could do something similar to what lawyers can: increase patient waiting time and strew their offices with preventive and alternative medicine pamphlets and other helpful information. In effect, this amounts to giving (potential) patients a break from physician services both in the office and in the longer term.

It can benefit services that are over-subscribed and have crowded premises, especially by patients with preventable illnesses and conditions or “emergencies” that can be prevented or do not require medical attention.

Although the longer wait is likely to exacerbate crowding initially, it may, over time, reduce it, as the benefits of patient education kick in, e.g., through pamphlets with information about how to prevent, as well as treat, tick bites and Lyme disease.

Practicing what I’m preaching here, I’ll stop at this point and give you a break from my services…

…and hope it makes you come back for more.

By Michael Moffa