🚀 go-pugleaf

On 13 Jun 1995 22:27:08 PDT, dk@crl.com (David A. Kaye) said:

> Robert McMillin wrote:
> : "Maybe Kaiwan not for
> : you" seems typical of the customer stories I've heard.  Certainly,
> : they don't seem to have anyone down there who speaks English well.

> I judge business people by the job they do.  My barber is a Chinese woman
> who barely speaks English but gives me excellent service exactly as I like
> it.  I get my peripherals from a store run by Koreans who also barely
> speak English, but have exactly what I need when I need it, and for an
> excellent price.  My local grocers are mainly Mexicans and Arabs, both of
> whom have been open longer hours and had in stock exactly what I needed
> and at good prices. 

That's fine.  I want to be able to hold a conversation with someone
selling me a service without having to constantly guess at what
they're saying, especially when 100% of my contact with them is
telephonic.  If the people trying to sell me something can't make
themselves understood, or if I have to exert considerably more effort
to understand someone in one business over their competition, that
becomes a factor in whether I'll do business with them.  It's that
simple.

You'll notice that astute business owners in this country are picking
up on this in the reverse, that is, catering to people living in the
U.S. whose native tongue is not English.  Many banks (Bank of America,
for instance) now target Vietnamese and Spanish-speaking consumers.
Recently, the Wall Street Journal had an article describing a small
but rapidly growing pharmacy chain whose sole advantage over its
competitors was its willingness to use Spanish labels on its
prescriptions.
-- 
    Robert L. McMillin  | rlm@helen.surfcty.com | Netcom: rlm@netcom.com
     Jail to the Chief! | WWW: ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/rl/rlm/home.html
                      Ein Reich, ein Volk, ein Bubba!

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