I recently ordered coffee from Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, a publicly traded company located in Vermont. It was not my first order, but it may have been my last.
GMCR has a special order/re-order feature called Cafe EXPRESS. After signing up for it you can have coffees sent on a recurring basis. The part that got my attention was saving a dollar on each bag of coffee ordered through Cafe EXPRESS, therefore saving on shipping costs. Another benefit was a free gift and I wanted another excellent (except for the lid) GMCR vacuum travel tumbler. None of this came to pass.
I did the Cafe EXPRESS sign-up, made my coffee choices, and briefly saw a web page saying that I had save two dollars on two bags. Then something happened in their order system; the page quickly shifted to the regular order page, and my sign-up, money saved, and tumbler simply vanished. Gone. No record of a Cafe EXPRESS order. As it happened I had an order alright, just not the one I intended. It went through their regular system. When I got the order confirmation I began a series of emails regarding the order's mistake. The GMCR customer service rep, Jessica, replied, "Because you were not taken directly to the Cafe EXPRESS sign up page, you were not prompted to join the club." Well, yes I was prompted. I SAW THE PAGE SAYING I SAVED TWO DOLLARS! However, Jessica told me how I, and they, could rectify (someone's) mistake, but doing so would be a cluster f. I decided to forget the idea of rectification, but kept in mind the clunky experience that I'd never had with them before.
A week later the coffees arrived. One bag of Lake and Lodge, and one bag of Sumatran Lake Tawar. Mmmm. GMCR uses specially made vented bags that have very narrow seams on the edges, not down the middle of the back. The Sumatran's bag had come apart at one of the narrow seams and had spilled precious and costly coffee into the shipping box. GREAT! Ordering problems, and now this! I fired off another email to Jessica, who kept a calm and cool demeanor as I told her that I wanted a replacement bag at no additional expense or burden on my part. That is, take it on faith because I was not going to spend two dollars in gasoline driving across town to mail back the burst bag. Jessica and Green Mountain handled it with aplomb and agreed to do so. All she wanted was the bar code/production info. I supplied it on the same day I got shipping confirmation on the replacement bag.
It took about three weeks from initial order to getting the replacement bag into my coffee cabinet, and will be another week or two before I get to open it because I had to finish off the Lake and Lodge, which is too light duty for my taste, and a bag of Starbucks Sumatra I already had open.
Yes, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters made good on the burst bag. But, you know what? After all this I never did save the two dollars and didn't get another vacuum tumbler. And the tumbler was what I really wanted!
